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MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 



BY THE 



REV. JOHN R. MACDUFF, D.D. 



1 1 



AUTHOR OF 
" MORNING AND NIGHT WATCHES," "WORDS OF JESUS," " MIND OF JESUS., 
11 FOOTSTEPS OF ST. PAUL," " FAMILY PRAYERS," " MEMORIES OF 
GENNESARRT," " STORY OF BETHLEHEM," ETC. 



Vit? 




NEW YORK: 
ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, 



No. 530 BROADWAY. 
1864. 



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o 










TO 



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a r it t x t x \\ 



t a n, 



WITH WHO 



BETHANY 



HAS EVER BEEN A NAME CONSECRATED TO SORROW, 



THESE 



>ti c m o r i e s 



ARE INSCRIBE 



PASSAGES REFERRING TO BETHANY 
IN THE SACRED NARRATIVE, 



I. 

Earliest Notice of <!2Set5an£. 



Luke X. 38-42. — "And He entered into a certain village: and a eertala 
woman named Martha received Him into her house. And sha 
had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus' feet, and heard 
His word. But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and 
came to Him, and said, Lord, dost Thou not care that my sister 
hath left me to serve alone 1 bid her therefore that she help me. 
And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou 
art careful and troubled about many things : But one thing is 
needful : and Mary hath chosen that good part, whicli shall nob 
be taken away from her." 



Sfottmng in connexion ttntf) tit &\thntg$, ^eatfc, ant 
CImirrcction of 3£a5aru£. 

John xr. 1. — " Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of 
Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha. (It was th at 



9 



• 



Tl PASSAGES REFERRING TO BETHANY 

Mary which anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped His 
feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.) Therefore 
his sisters sent unto Him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom Thou 
lovest is sick. When Jesus heard that, He said, This sickness 
is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God 
might be glorified thereby. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her 
. sister, and Lazarus. When He had heard therefore that he was 
sick, He abode two days still in the same place sriiere He was." 
• • • • •••• 

"And after that He saith unto them, Our friend Lazarus 
sleepeth ; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep. Then 
said His disciples, Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well. Howbeit 
Jesus spake of His death : but they thought that He had spoken 
of taking of rest in sleep. Then said Jesus unto them plainly, 
Lazarus is dead. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not 
there, to the intent ye may believe ; nevertheless, let us go unto 
him." 



"Then, when Jesus came, He found that he had lain in 
the grave four days already. (Now Bethany was nigh unto Jeru- 
salem, about fifteen furlongs off.) And many of the Jews came 
to Martha and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother. 
Then Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went 
and met Him : but Mary sat still in the house. Then said 
Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother 
had not died. But I know, that even now, whatsoevei thou 
wilt ask of God, God will grve it Thee. Jesus saith unto her, 
Thy brother shall rise again. Martha saith unto Him, I know 
that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day. Jesus 
said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life : He that be- 
lieveth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live : And who- 
soever liveth, and believeth in Me, shall never die. Believest 
thou this 1 She saith unto Him, Yea, Lord : I believe that 
Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the 
world. And when she had so said, she went her way, and called 
Mary her sister secretly, saying, The Master is come, and calleth 
for thee. As soon as she heard that, she arose quickly, and came 
unto Him. Now Jesus was not yet come into the town, but was 
in that place where Martha met Him. 2"be Jews then which 



IN THE SACKED NARRATIVE. 



VH 



were with her in the house, and comforted her, when they saw 
Mary, that she rose up hastily and went out, Moved her, say- 
ing, She goeth unto the grave to weep there. Then when Mary 
was come where Jesus was, and saw Him, she fell down at His 
feet, saying unto Him, Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my bro- 
ther had not died. When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and 
the Jews also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the 
spirit, and was troubled, and said, Where have ye laid him 1 
They say unto Him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept. Then 
said the Jews, Behold how He loved him ! And some of them 
said, Could not this man, which opened the eyes of the blind, 
have caused that even this man should not have died ! Jesus 
therefore again groaning in Himself, cometh to the grave. It 
was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. Jesus said, Take ye away 
the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto 
Him, Lord, by this time he stinketh : for he hath been dead 
four days. Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee, that, if 
thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of Gfod % Then 
they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. 
And Jesus lifted up His eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee 
that Thou hast heard Me. And I knew that Thou hearest Me 
always : but because of the people which stand by I said it, that 
they may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And when He thus 
had spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. 
And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with 
grave-clothes; and his face was bound about with a napkia, 
Jesus saith unto them, Loose him, and let him go." 



in. 



$totice£ of ^etfcang ?"itfi£cqtttnt to t&e Utai>"ins of Hasacu^ 



John xii. 1-8. — " Then Jesus, six days before the Passover, came to 
Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he 
raised from the dead. There they- made Him a supper ; and 



• » • 



V1H PASSAGES REFERRING TO BETHANY 

Martha served : "but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the 
table with Him. Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spike- 
nard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His 
feet with her hair : and the house was filled with the odour of 
the ointment. Then saith one of His disciples, Judas Iscariot, 
Simon's son, which should betray Him, Why was not this oint- 
ment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor ? This 
he said, not that he cared for the poor ; but because he was a 
thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein. Then 
said Jesus, Let her alone : against the day of My burying hath 
she kept this. For the poor always ye have with you ; but Me 
ye have not always," 

Matthew xxvi. 12-13.— " For in that she hath poured this ointment 
on my body, she did it for my burial. Yerily I say unto you, 
Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, 
there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a 
memorial of her." 

John xii. 9.— "Much people of the Jews therefore knew that He was 
there : and they came not for Jesus' sake only, but that they 
might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead." 



John xii. 12-15. — "On the next day much people that were come to the 
feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took 
branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet Him, and cried, 
Hosanna : Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name 
of the Lord. And Jesus, when He had found a young ass, sat 
thereon ; as it is written, Fear not, daughter of Sion : behold, 
thy King cometh, sitting on an ass's colt." 

Matthew xxi. 10-12. — ' ' And when He was come into Jerusalem, all 
the city was moved, saying, Who is this 1 And the multitude 
said, This is Jesus the Prophet of Nazareth of Galilee. And 
Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that 
sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the 
money-changers, and the seats of them that sold doves.** 



IN THE SACRED NARRATIVE. IX 

Makk xi. 11-15. — " And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into the 
temple : and when He had looked round about upon all things, 
and now the eventide was come, he went outunto Bethany, with 
the twelve. And on the morrow, when the;* were come from 
Bethany, He was hungry : And seeing a fig-tree afar off having 
leaves, He came, if haply he might find any thing thereon : and 
when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves ; for the time 
of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No 
man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And His disciples 
heard it. And they come to Jerusalem : and Jesus went into 
the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in 
the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money-changers, and 
the seats of them that sold doves." 

Verse 19-20.— "And when even was come, He went out of the city. 
And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig-tree 
dried up from the roots." . 



LrKE xxiv. 50-52. — "And He led them out as far as to Bethany : and 
He lifted up His hands, and blessed them. And it came to 
pass, while He blessed them, He was parted from them, and 
carried up into Heaven. And they worshipped Him, and re- 
turned to Jerusalem with great joy." 

Acts i. 9-12. — " And when. He had spoken these things, while they 
beheld, He was taken up ; and a cloud received Him out of their 
sight. And, while they looked stedfastly toward Heaven as He 
went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; 
which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into 
Heaven 1 this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into Hea- 
ven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into 
Heaven. Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the Mount 
called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a Sabbath-day's journey." 



to)HAMAH xiv. 4. — "And His feet shall stand in that day upon 
the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and 

b 



PASSAGES REFERRING TO BETHANY, ETC. 

the Mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the 
east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley ; 
and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and 
half of it toward the south." 



"And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go 
out from Jerusalem ; half of them toward the former sea, and half 
of them toward the hinder sea : in summer and in winter shall 
it be. And the Lord shall be King over all the earth: in that 
day shall there be one Lord, and his name one." 

• ••••« «• 

' * And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all 
the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from 
year to year to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, and to keejr 
the feast of Tabernacles." 



CONTENTS, 



I. OPENING THOUGHTS . < 1 

II. THE HOME SCENE 1 11 

IIL LESSONS 24 

IV. THE MESSENGER 34 

V. THE MESSAGE - 42 

VI. THE SLEEPEE 53 

VII. LIGHTS AND SHADOWS 6T 

fill. THE MOUENEE'S COMFOBT 7T 

IX. THE MOUENEE'S CREED.... ., 84 

X. THE MASTEE 92 

XI. SECOND CAUSES. . 100 

XII. THE WEEPING SAVIOUR 108 

XIII. THE GEAVE-STONE 125 

XIV. UNBELIEF . . 184 



e e 



Xll CONTENTS* 

XY. THE DIVINE PLEADER 141 

XYI. THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. .. 151 

XYIL THE BOX OF OINTMENT .. 161 

XYIII. PALM BRANCHES * 1T8 

XIX, THE FIG-TREE ....... 191 

XX. CLOSING HOURS 211 

XXI. THE LAST YISIT : 221 

XXIL ANGELIC COMFORTERS ,. 240 

XXIII THE DISCIPLES' RETURN ..v>., .,..>» 1ST 



MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 



« 

Places associated with great minds are always 
interesting. What a halo of moral grandeur must 
ever be thrown around that spot which was hal- 
lowed above all others by the Lord of glory as 
the scene of His most cherished earthly friend- 
ship ! However holy be the memories which en- 
circle other localities trodden by Him in the days 
of His flesh; — Bethlehem, with its manger cradle, 
its mystic star, and adoring cherubim — Nazareth, 
the nurturing home of His youthful affections — 
Tiberias ; whose shores so often echoed to His 



2 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

footfall, or whose waters in stillness or in storm 
bore Him on their bosom — the crested heights 
where He uttered His beatitudes— the midnight 
mountains where He prayed — the garden where 
He suffered — the hill where He died, — there is no 
one single resort in His divine pilgrimage on 
which sanctified thought loves so fondly to dwell 
as on the home and village of Bethany. 

Its hours of sacred converse have long ago fled. 
Its honoured family have slumbered for ages ' in 
their tomb. Bethany's Lord has been for cen- 
times enthroned amid the glories of a brighter 
home. But though its Memories are all that 
remain ; the place is still fragrant with His pre- 
sence. The echoes of His voice — words of un- 
earthly sweetness — still linger around it ; and 
have for eighteen hundred years served to cheer 
and encourage niany a fainting pilgrim in his 
upward ascent to the true Bethany above ! 

There, the Redeemer of the world proclaimed 
a brief but impressive Gospel. Heaven and earth 
seemed then to touch one another. We have 
the tender tones of a Man blended with the in- 
effable majesty of God. Hopes u full of immor- 



OPENING THOUGHTS, 3 

tality" shine with their celestial rainbow-hues 
amid a shower of holy tears. The cancelling 
from our Bibles of the 11th chapter of St John 
would he like the blotting out of the brightest 
planet from the spiritual firmament. Each of its 
magnificent utterances has proved like a minis ter- 
ing-angel — a seraph-messenger bearing its live- 
coakof comfort to the broken, bleeding heart from 
the holiest altar which Sympathy (divine and 
human) ever upreared in a trial- world! Many 
has been the weary footstep and tearful eye that 
has hastened in thought to Bethany — " gone to 
the grave of Lazarus, to weep there." 

u The town of Mary and her sister Martha/' 
then, furnishes us alike with a garnered treasury 
of Christian solaces, and one of the very love- 
liest of the Bible's domestic portraitures. If the 
story of Joseph and his brethren is in the Old 
Testament invested with surpassing interest, here 
is a Gospel home-scene in the New, of still deeper 
and tenderer pathos — a picture in which the true 
Joseph appears as the central figure, without any 
estrangements to mar its beauty. Often at other 
times a drapery of woe hangs over the pathway 



4 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

of the Man of Sorrows. But Bethany is bathed 
in sunshine;— a sweet oasis in his toil-worn pil- 
grimage. At this quiet abode of congenial spirits 
he seems to have had his main " sips at the 
fountain of human joy," and to have obtained a 
temporary respite from unwearied labour and un- 
merited enmity. The a Lily among thorns' 5 
raised His drooping head in this Eden home! 
Thither we can follow Him from the courts of 
the Temple — the busy crowd — the lengthened 
journey — the miracles of mercy — the hours of vain 
and ineffectual pleading with obdurate hearts. 
"We can picture Him as the inmate of a peaceful 
family, spirit blending with spirit in sanctified 
communion. We can mark the tenderness of 
His holy humanity. We can see how He loved, 
and sympathised, and wept, and rejoiced! 

As the tremendous events which signalised 
the close of His pilgrimage drew on, still it is 
Bethany with which they are mainly associated. 
It was at Bethany the fearful visions of His cross 
and passion cast their shadow on His path ! Frcm 
its quiet palm-trees * He issued forth on His last 

• Bethany signifies literally w The house of dates" 



OPENING THOUGHTS. 5 

day's journey across Mount Olivet. It was with 
Bethany in view He ascended to heaven. Its 
soil, was the last He trod — its homes were the 
last on which His eye rested when the cloud 
received Hirn up into glory. The beams of the 
Sun of Righteousness seemed as if they loved to 
linger on this consecrated height. 

We cannot doubt that many incidents regard- 
ing His oft sojournings there are left unrecorded. 
We have more than once, indeed, merely the 
simple announcement in the inspired narrative 
that He retired from Jerusalem all night to the 
village where His friend Lazarus resided. We 
dare not withdraw more of the veil than the Word 
of God permits. Let us be grateful for what 
we have of the gracious unfoldings here vouch- 
safed of His inner life — the comprehensive inter- 
mingling of doctrine, consolation, comfort, and 
instruction in righteousness. His Bethany say- 
ings are for all time — they have "gone through all 
the earth" — His Bethany words "to the end of the 
world!" Like its own alabaster box of precious 
ointment, "wheresoever the Gospel is preached," 
there will these be held in grateful memorial. 



6 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

The traveller in Palestine is to this day shewn, 
in a sort of secluded ravine on the eastern slope 
of the Mount of Olives (about fifteen furlongs or 
two miles from Jerusalem), a cluster of poor cot- 
tages, numbering little more than twenty families, 
with groups of palm-trees surrounding them, inter- 
spersed here and there with the olive, the almond, 
the pomegranate, and the fig.* 

This ruined village bears the Arab name of 
El-Azirezeh — the Arabic form of the name 
Lazarus — and at once identifies it with a spot 
so sacred and interesting in Gospel story. It is 
described by the most recent and discerning of 
Eastern writers as " a wild mountain hamlet, 
screened by an intervening ridge from the view 
of the top of Olivet — perched on its open plateau 
of rock — the last collection of human habitations 
before the desert hills that reach to Jericho. 

High in the distance are the 

Persean mountains; the foreground is the deep 
descent of the mountain valley. 7 ' f 

* " The figs of Bethany" are mentioned specially by the Rabbins^g 
being subject to tithiDg. 
f Stanley's " Sinai and Palestine." 



OPENING- THOUGHTS. f 

"The fields around/' says another traveller, 
"lie uncultivated, and covered with rank grass 
and wild flowers; hut it is easy to imagine the 
deep and still beauty of this spot when it was the 
home of Lazarus and his sisters, Martha and 
Mary. Defended on the north and west by the 
Mount of Olives, it enjoys a delightful exposure 
to the southern sun. The grounds around are 
obviously of great fertility, though quite ne- 
glected; and the prospect to the south-east com- 
mands a magnificent view of the Dead Sea and 
the plains of Jordan."* 



ft 



On the horizon's verge, 
The last faint traeing on the blue expanse, 
Pvise Moab's summits ; and above the rest 
One pinnacle, where, placed by Hand Divine, 
Israel's great leader stood, allow'd to view, 
And but to view, that long-expected land 
He may not now enjoy. Below, dim gleams 
The sea, untenanted by ought that lives, 
And Jordan's waters thread the plain unseen, 

• . • . . • • • 

Here, hid among her trees, a village clings — 
Koof above roof uprising. White the walls, 
And whiter still by contrast ; and those roofs, 
Broad sunny platforms, strew'd with ripening gr&bu 
Some wandering olive or unsocial fig 

* Anderson. 



8 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

Amid the broken rocks which bound the path 
Snatches scant nurture from the creviced stone. 



"• 



Before closing these prefatory remarks, the ques- 
tion cannot fail to liave occurred to the most un- 
observant reader,, why the history of the Family of 
Bethany and the Resurrection of Lazarus, in them- 
selves so replete with interest and instruction — 
the latter, moreover, forming, as it did, so notable 
a crisis in the Saviour's life — should* have been 
recorded only by the Evangelist John. Strange 
that the other inspired penmen should ha^e left 
altogether unchronicled this touching episode in 
sacred writ. One or other of two reasons — or 
both combined — we may accept as the most satis- 
factory explanation regarding what, after all, must 
remain a difficulty. John alone of the Gospel 
writers narrates the transactions which took place 
in Judea in connexion with the Saviour's public 
ministry, — the others restricted themselves mainly 
to the incidents and events of His Galilean life 
and journeys ; at all events, till they come to the 
closing scene of all.f There is another reason 

* Bartlett's " Walks about Jerusalem.* 
f Neander's " Life of Christ." 



OPENING THOUGHTS. 8 

equally probable : — A wise Christian prudence^ 
and delicate consideration for the feelings of ths 
livings may have prevented the other Evangelists 
giving publicity to facts connected with their 
Lord's greatest miracle ; a premature disclosure of 
which might have exposed Lazarus and his sisters 
to the violence of the unscrupulous persecutors of 
the day. They would, moreover, (as human feel- 
ings are the same in every age,) naturally shrink 
from violating the peculiar sacredness of domestic 
grief by publishing circumstantially its details 
while the mourners and the mourned still lingered 
at their Bethany home. Well did they know that 
that Holy Spirit at whose dictation they wrote, 
would not suffer u the Church of the future" to 
be deprived of so precious a record of divine love 
and power. Hence the sacred task of being the 
Biographer of Lazarus was consigned to their aged 
survivor. 

When the Apostle of Patmos wrote his Gos- 
pel, as is supposed in distant Ephesus, Mary, 
Martha, and Lazarus were, in all likelihood, re- 
posing in their graves. Happily so, too, for ere this 
the Roman armies were encamped almost within 



10 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

sight of their old dwelling, and the inhabitants of 
Jerusalem "undergoing their unparalleled sufferings. 
Add to this, John, of all the Evangelists, was 
Tbest qualified to do justice to this matchless pic- 
ture/ Baptized himself with the spirit of love, his 
inspired pencil could best portray the lights and 
shadows in this lovely and loving household. Pre- 
eminently like his Lord, he could best delineate 
the scene of all others where the tenderness of 
that tender Saviour shone most conspicuous. He 
was the disciple who had leant on His bosom — 
who had been admitted by Him to nearest and 
most confiding fellowship. He would have the 
Church, to the latest period of time, to enjoy the 
same. He interrupts, therefore, the course of his 
narrative that he may lift the veil w T hich enshrouds 
the private life of Jesus, and exhibit Him in all 
ages in the endearing attitude and relation of a 
Human Friend. Immanuel is transfigured on this 
Mount of Love before His suffering and glory! 
The Bethany scene, with its tints of soft and mel- 
lowed sunlight, forms a -pleasing background to 
the sadder and more awful events which crowd 
the Gospel's closing chapters. 



* 




n. 



t Jponte Bmxt. 

The curtain rises on a quiet Judean village, the 
sanctuary of three holy hearts. Each of the 
inmates have some strongly-marked traits of 
individual character. These have been so often 
delicately and truthfully drawn that it is the less 
necessary to dwell minutely upon them here. 
There is abundant material in the narrative to 
discover to" us, in the sisters, two characters — both 
interesting in themselves, both beloved by Jesus, 
both needful in the Church of God, but at the 
same time widely different, preparing by a 
diverse education for heaven — requiring, as we 
shall find, from Him who best knew their diver- 
sity, a separate and peculiar treatment. 

Martha, the elder (probably the eldest of the 
family) has been accurately represented as the 



12 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

type of activity ; bustling, energetic, impulsive, 
well qualified to Ibe the head of the household, 
and to grapple with the stern realities and routine 
of actual life ; quick in apprehension, strong and 
vigorous in intellect, anxious to give a reason for 
all she did, and requiring a reason for the conduct 
of others ; a useful if not a noble character, com- 
bining diligence in business with fervency in 
spirit. 

Mary, again, Avas the type of reflection; calm, 
meek, devotional, contemplative, sensitive in feel- 
ing, ill suited to battle with the cares and sorrows, 
the strifes and griefs of an engrossing and encum- 
bering world ; one of those gentle flowers that pine 
and bend under the rough blasts of life, easily 
battered down by hail and storm, but as ready to 
raise its drooping leaves under heavenly influences. 
Her position was at her Lord's feet, drinking in 
those living waters which came welling up fresh 
from the great Fountain of life; asking no ques- 
tions, declining all arguments, gentle and submis- 
sive, a beautiful impersonation of the childlike 
faith which " beareth all things, hopeth all things, 
belkveth all things." While her sister can so 



THE HOME SCENE. 13 

command ter feelings as to be alble to rush forth to 
meet her Lord outside the village, calm and self- 
possessed, to unbosom to Him all her hopes and 
fears, and even to interrogate Him about death 
and the resurrection, Mary can only meet Him 
buried in her all-absorbing grief. The crushed 
leaves of that flower of paradise are bathed and 
saturated with dewy tears. She has not a word of 
remonstrance. Jesus speaks to Martha — chides 
her — reasons with her ; with Mary, He knew that 
the heart was too full, the wound too deep, to 
bear the probing of word or argument ; He speaks, 
therefore, in the touching pathos of her own silent 
grief. Her melting emotion has its response in 
His own. In one word, Martha was* one of those 
meteor spirits rushing to and fro amid the ceaseless 
activities of life, softened and saddened, but not 
prostrated and crushed by the sudden inroads of 
sorrow. Mary, again, we think of as one of those 
angel forms which now and then seem to walk the 
earth from the spirit-land; a quiet evening star, 
shedding its mellowed radiance among deepening 
twilight shadows, as if her home was in a brighter 
sphere, and her choice, as we know it was, "a 



14 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

better part, that never could be taken from her."* 
Beautifully and delicately has a Christian poet 
thus drawn her loving character:— 

"Oh, blest beyond all daughters of the East ! 

What were the Orient thrones to that low seat 
Where thy hush'd spirit drew celestial birth ! 

Mary ! meek listener at the Saviour's feet, 

No feverish cares to that divine retreat 
Thy woman's heart of silent worship brought, 

But a fresh childhood, heavenly truth to meet 
With love and wonder and submissive thought. 

Oh ! for the holy quiet of thy breast, 
Midst the world's eager tones and footsteps flying, 
Thou whose calm soul was like a well -spring, lying 

So deep and still in its transparent rest, 
That e'en when noontide burns upon the hills, 
Some one bright solemn star all its lone mirror fills/' 

Of Lazarus, around whom the main interest ot 
the narrative gathers, we have fewer incidental 
touches to guide us in giving individuality to his 
character. This, however, we may infer, from the 
poignant sorrow of the twin hearts that were so 
unexpectedly broken, that he was a loved and 
lamented only brother, a sacred prop around which 
their tenderest affections were entwined. Included 

* t( What Mary fell short in words she made up in tears. She 
laid less than Martha, but wept more ; and tears of devout affection 
iiave a voice, a loud prevailing voice — no rhetoric like that."— 
Matthew Henry. 



THE HOME SCENE. 15 

too, as he was, in the love which the Divine 
Saviour bore to the household (for u Jesus loved 
Lazarus "), is it presumptuous to imagine that his 
spirit had been east into much the same human 
mould as that of his beloved Lord, and that the 
friendship of Jesus for him had been formed on the 
same principles on which friendships are formed 
still — a similarity of disposition, some mental and 
moral resemblances and idiosyncrasies? They 
were like-minded, so far as a fallible nature and 
the nature of a stainless humanity could be assi- 
milated. We can think of him as gentle, retir- 
ing, amiable, forgiving, heavenly-minded ; an im- 
perfect and shadowy, it may be, but still a faithful 
reflection and transcript of incarnate loveliness. 
May we not venture to use regarding him his 
Lord's eulogy on another, u Behold an Israelite 
indeed, in whom is no guile ! " 

Nor must we forget, in this rapid sketch, what 
a precious unfolding we have in this home por- 
traiture of the humanity of the Saviour ! " The 
Man Christ Jesus" stands in softened majesty and 
tenderness before our view. He who had a heart 
capacious enough to takfc in all mankind, had yet 



16 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY- 

His likings (sinless partialities) for individuals and 
minds which, were more than others congenial and 
kindred with His own. As there are some heart 
sanctuaries where we can more readily rush to 
bury the tale of our sorrows or unburden our per- 
plexities, so had He. " Jesus wept ! " — this speaks 
of Him as the human Sympathiser. " Jesus loved 
Lazarus" — this speaks of Him as the human 
Friend! He had an ardent affection for all His 
disciples, but even among them there was an inner 
circle of holier attachments — a Peter, and James, 
and John ; and out of this sacred trio again there 
was one pre-eminently " Beloved." So, amid the 
hallowed haunts of Palestine, the homes of Judea, 
the cities of Galilee, there was but one Bethany. 
It is delightful thus to think of the heart of Jesus 
in all but sin as purely human, identical and iden- 
tified with our own. He was no hermit-spirit 
dwelling in mysterious solitariness apart from His 
fellows, but open to the charities of life; — in all 
His refined and hallowed sensibilities ll made like 
unto His brethren." Friendship is itself a holy 
thing. The bright intelligences in the uppei 
sanctuary know it and experience it. They " cry 



THE "HOME SCENE. 17. 

one to another." Theirs is no solitary strain — 
no isolated existence. Unlike the planets in the 
material firmament, shining distant and apart, they 
are rather clustering constellations, whose gravi- 
tation-law is unity and love, this binding them to 
one another, and all to God. Nay — with reve- 
rence we say it — may not the archetype of all 
friendship be found shadowed forth in what is 
higher still, those mystic and ineffable commun- 
ings subsisting between Father, Son, and Holy 
Spirit in a past eternity? We can thus regard 
the friendship of Jesus on earth — like all en- 
nobled, purified affections — as an emanation from 
foe Divine ; a sacred and holy rill, flowing direct 
from the Fountain of infinite love. How our 
adorable Lord in the days of His flesh fondly 
clurg even to hearts that grew faithless when fide- 
lity vas most needed ! What was it but a noble 
and touching tribute to the longings and suscepti- 
bilities of His holy soul for human friendship, 
when, on entering the precincts of Gethsemane, 
He tlus sought to mitigate the untold sorrows 
of that awful hour — " Tarry ye here and watch 
withiYe/" 



18 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

But to return. Such was the home around 
which the memories of its inmates and our own 
loye to linger. 

Mary, Martha ; and Lazarus — all three partakers 
of the same grace, fellow-pilgrims Zionward, and 
that journey sanctified and hallowed by a sacred 
fellowship with the Lord of pilgrims. The Sa- 
viour's own precious promise seems under that 
roof of lowly unobtrusive love to receive a living 
fulfilment : " Where two or three are gathered 
together in my name ; there am I in the midst of 
them." Though many a gorgeous palace was at 
that era adorning the earth ; where was the spot, 
what the dwelling, half so consecrated as this? 
Solomon had a thousand years before, two mihs 
distant, in presence of assembled Israel, uttered 
the exclamation, " But will God in very ceed 
dwell with men upon earth?" He was now 
verily dwelling! Nor was it under anj- gor- 
geous canopy or august temple. He had S3lected 
Three Human Souls as the shrines He most loved. 
He had sought their holy, heavenly convene as 
the sweetest incense and costliest sacrifice, How 
or where they first saw JeSus we caniot telL 



THE HOME SCENE. 19 

They had probably been among the number of 
those pious Jews who had prayerfully w T aited 
for the " consolation of Israel/' and who had lived 
to see their fondest wishes arid hopes realised. 
The Evangelist gives no information regarding 
their previous history. The narrative all at once, 
with an abruptness of surpassing beauty, leaves us 
in no doubt that the Divine Redeemer had been 
for long a well-known guest in that sunlit home, 
and that, when the calls and duties of His public 
ministry were suspended, many an hour was spent 
in the enjoyment of its peaceful seclusion. 

We can fancy, and no more, these oft happy 
meetings, when the Pilgrim Saviour, weary and 
worn, was seen descending the rocky footpath of 
Olivet, — Lazarus or his sisters, from the flat roof 
of their dwelling, or under the spreading fig-tree, 
eager to catch the first glimpse of His approach. 

When seated in the house, w r e may picture theit 
converse : Themes of sublime and heavenly im- 
port, unchronicled by the inspired penmen, which 
sunk deep into those listening spirits, and nerved 
two of them for an after-hour of unexpected sor- 
row, if there be bliss in the interchange of com- 



20 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

munion between Christian and Christian, what 
must it haye Tbeen to have had the presence and 
fellowship of the Lord Himself! Not seeing 
Him, as we see Him, " behind the lattice," but 
seated underneath His shadow, drinking in the 
living tones of His living voice. These " children 
of Zion" must, indeed, have been "joyful in their 
King." 

One of these hallowed seasons is that referred to 
in the 10th of St Luke, where Martha the mini- 
stering spirit, and Mary the lowly disciple, are 
first introduced to our notice. That visit is con- 
jectured to have occurred when Jesus was return- 
ing to the country from the Feast of Tabernacles, 
The Bethany circle dreamt not then of their im- 
pending trial. But, foreseen as it was by Him 
who knows the end from the beginning, may we 
not well believe one reason (the main reason) for 
His going thither was to soothe them in the 
prospect of a saddened home? So that, when 
the stroke did descend, they might be cheered and 
consoled with the remembrances of His visit, and 
of the gracious words which proceeded out of His 
mouth. 



THE HOME SCENE. 21 

And is not this still the way Jesus deals with 
His people ? He visits them often by some pre- 
cious love- tokens — some special manifestations of 
His grace and presence before the hour of trial. 
So that ; when that hour does come, they may not 
be altogether prostrated or overwhelmed with it. 
Like Elijah of old, they have their miraculous food 
provided before they encounter the sterile desert. 
When they come to speak of their crushed hearts, 
they have solaces to tell of too. Their language 
is, u I will sing of mercy and judgment!" 

We may be led to inquire why a character so 
lovely as that of Lazarus was not enlisted along 
with the other disciples in the active service of the 
Apostleship. Why should Peter and Andrew, 
John and James, be summoned from their boats 
and nets on Gennesaret to follow Jesus, and this 
other, imbued with the same spirit and honoured 
with the same regard, be left alone and undis- 
turbed in his village home ? 

" To every man there is a work." Some are 
more peculiarly called to active duty, and better 
fitted for it ; others for passive obedience and suf- 



22 MEMOBIES OF BETHANY. 

ferlng. Some are selected as bold standard-bearers 
of the cross, others to give their testimony in the 
quiet seclusion of domestic life. Some are specially 
gifted, as Paul, to appear in the halls of Nero or 
on the heights of Mars' Hill, and, confronting face 
to face the world's boasted wisdom, maintain intact 
the honour of their Lord. Others are required to 
glorify Him on beds of sickness, or in homes of 
sorrow, or in the holy consistent tenor of their 
everyday walk. Some are called as Levites to 
temple service ; others to give the uncostly cup of 
cold water, or the widow's mite ; others to mani- 
fest the meek, gentle, unselfish, resigned, forgiving 
heart, when there is no cup or mite to offer J 

Believer ! rejoice that your path is marked out 
for you. Tour lot in life, with all its " accidents," 
is your Lord's appointing. Dream not, in your 
own short-sighted wisdom, that, had you occupied 
some other or more prominent position — had your 
talents been greater, or your worldly influence 
more extensive — you might have glorified your 
God in a way which is at present denied to you. 
He can be served in the lowliest as well as in the 
most exalted stations. As the tiniest leaf or 



THE HOME SCENE. 23 

smallest star in the world of nature reflects His 
glory as well as the giant mountain or blazing 
sun, so does He graciously own and recognise the 
humblest effort of lowly love no less than the 
most lavish gifts which splendid munificence and 
costly devotion can cast into His treasury. Let 
it be your great aim and ambition to honour 
Him just in the position He has seen meet to 
assign you. u Let every man," says the Apostle, 
u wherein he is called, therein abide with God." 
However limited your sphere, you may become 
a centre of holy influences to the little world 
around you. Your heart may be an incense-altar 
of love and affection, kindness and gentleness to 
man — your life a perpetual hymn of praise to your 
Father in Heaven ; glorifying Him, like Martha, 
by active service; like Mary, by sitting at His 
feet; or, like Lazarus, by holy living and happy 
dying, and leaving behind you "the Memory of 
the Just" which is " blessed." 



m. 



As yet tlie home of Bethany is all happiness. Ths 
burial-ground has been untraversed since, probably, 
years before the dust of one, or perhaps both 
parents had been committed to the sepulchre.* 
Death had long left the inmates an unbroken 
circle. Can it be that the unwelcome intruder is 
so nigh at hand? — that their now joyous dwelling 
is so soon to echo to the wail of lamentation? We 
imagine it but lately visited by Jesus. In a 
little while the arrow hath sped; the sacredness 
of a divine friendship is no guarantee against the 
incursion of the sleepless foe of human happiness. 
Bethany is a mourning household. The sisters 
are bowed in the agony of their worst bereave- 
ment — the prop of their existence is laid low— 
u Lazarus is dead!" 

* Note.— See p. 173 



LESSONS. 25 

At the very threshold of this touching story, 
are we not called on to pause, and read the uncer- 
tainty of earth's best joys and purest happiness; 
that the brightest sunshine is often the precursor 
of a dark cloud. When the gourd is all flourishing, 
a worm may unseen he preying at its root ! When 
the vessel is gliding joyously on the calm sea, the 
treacherous rock may be at hand, and, in one. brief 
hour, it has become a shattered wreck ! 

It is the touching record of the inspired historian 
in narrating Abraham's heaviest trial — u After 
these things j God did tempt Abraham." After 
what things? After a season of rich blessings, 
gilding a future with bright hopes I 

Would that, amidst our happy homes, and 
sunshine hours, and seasons of holy and joyous 
intercourse between friend and friend, we would 
more habitually bear in mind u This is not to 
last!" In one brief and unsuspected moment 
Lazarus may be taken. The messenger may now 
be on the wing to lay low some treasured object 
of earthly solicitude and love. God would teach 
us — while we are glad of our gourds — not to be 
"exceeding glad;" not to nestle here as if we 



26 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

were to u live alway," but rather, as we are perched 
on our summer boughs, to be ready at His bidding 
to soar away, and leave behind us what most we 
prize. 

It tells us, too, the utter mysteriousness of many 
of the divine dispensations. 

"Lazarus is dead!" What! He, the head, 
and support, and stay of two helpless females? 
The joy and solace of a common orphanhood, — a 
brother evidently made and born for their adver- 
sities? What! Lazarus, whom Jesus tenderly 
loved? How much, even to his Lord, will be 
buried in that early grave ! We may well expect, 
if there be one homestead in all Palestine guarded 
by the overshadowing wings of angels to debar the 
entrance of death, whose inmates may pillow their 
heads night after night in the confident assurance 
of immunity from trial, it. must surely be that 
loved resort — that " Arbour in His Hill Diffi- 
culty," where the God-man delighted oft to pause 
and refresh His wearied body and aching mind. 
Will Omnipotence not have set its mark, as of old, 
on the door-posts and lintels of that consecrated 
dwelling, so that the destroyer, in going his rounds 



LESSONS. 27 

elsewhere, may pass by it unscathed ? How, too, 
can the infant Church spare him ? The aged 
Simeon or Anna we dare not wish to detain. 
Burdened with years and infirmities, after having 
got a glimpse of their Lord and Saviour, let them 
depart in peace, and receive their crowns. These 
decayed trees in the forest — those to whom old 
age on earth is a burden — let them how to the axe, 
and be transplanted to a nobler clime. But one 
in the vigour of life — one so beautifully combining 
natural amiability with Christian love — one who 
was pre-eminently the friend of Jesus, and that 
word profoundly suggestive of all that w r as lovely 
in a disciple's character. Death may visit other 
homes in that sequestered village, and spread 
desolation in other hearts, but surely the Church's 
Lord will not suffer one of its pillars so prematurely 
to fall! 

And yet it is even so ! The mysterious 
summons has come ! — the most honoured home 
on earth has been rudely rifled ! — the most 
loving of hearts have been cruelly torn; and 
inscrutable is the dealing, for u Lazarus is 
dead/" 



28 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

" He, the young and strong, who cherish'd 
Noble longings for the strife, 
By the roadside fell, and perish'd 
On the threshold march of life." 

And worse, too, than all, " the Lord is absent. 5 * 
Why is Omniscience tarrying elsewhere, when 
His presence and power are above all needed at 
the house of His friend? 

The disconsolate sisters, in wondering amaze- 
ment, repeat over and over again the exclamation, 
" If Jesus had been here, this our brother had not 
died!" " Hath He forgotten to be gracious?" 
" Surely our way is hid from the Lord, our judg- 
ment is passed over from our God." 

Ah! the experience of His people is often still 
the same. What are many of God's dispensa- 
tions ? — a baffling enigma — all strangeness — all 
mystery to the eye of sense. Useless lives pro- 
longed, useful ones taken ! The honoured mini- 
ster of God struck down, the unfaithful watchman 
spared! The philanthropic and benevolent have 
an arrest put on their manifold deeds of kindness 
and generosity ; the grasping, the avaricious, the 
mean-souled — those who neither fear God nor do 
good to man ; are suffered to live on from day 



LESSONS. 29 

to day! What is it but the picture here pre- 
sented eighteen hundred years ago — Judas spared 
to be a traitor to his Lord ) while — Lazarus is 
dead! * 

But let us be still ! The Saviour, indeed, does 
not now lead us forth, amid the scene of our trial, 
as He did the bereft sisters, to unravel the mys- 
teries of His providence, and to shew glory to 
God, redounding from the darkest of His dispen- 
sations. To us the grand sequel is reserved for 
eternity. The grand development of the divine 
plan will not be fully accomplished till then; faith 

at 

must meanwhile rest satisfied with what is baf- 
fling to sight and sense. This whole narrative is 
designed to teach the lesson that there is an unde- 
veloped future in all God's dealings. There is 
an unseen " why and wherefore" which cannot 
be answered here. Our befitting attitude and 
language now is that of simple confidingness — 
iC Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" 
— Listening to one of these Bethany sayings (we 
shall by and by consider), whose meaning will be 
interpreted in a brighter world by Him who ut- 



30 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

tered it in the days of His flesh — " Said I not unto 
thee, that if thou wouldest believe thou shouldest 

eee the glory of God ?" 

»» 

^ "0 thou who mournest on thy way, # 

With longings for the close ot day, 
He walks with thee, that Angel kind, 
And gently whispers — ' Be resign'd; 
Bear up — bear on — the end shall tell, 
The dear Lord ordereth all things well/" 

Our duty, meanwhile, is that of children, simply 
to trust the faithfulness of a God whose footsteps 
of love we often fail to trace. All will be seen at 
last to have "been not only for the Best, but really 
the best. Dark clouds will be fringed with mercy. 
What we call now "baffling dispensations," will 
be seen to be wondrous parts of a great con- 
nected whole, — the wheel within wheel of that 
complex machinery, by which " all things ' (yes, 
ALL things) are now working together for good. 

"Lazarus is dead!" The choicest tree in the 
earthly Eden has succumbed to the blast. The 
choicest cup has been dashed to the ground. Some 
great lights in the moral firmament have been 
extinguished. But God can do without human 



LESSONS. 31 

agency. His Church can be preserved, though no 
Moses be spared to conduct Israel over Jordan, 
and no Lazarus to tell the story of his Saviour's 
grace and love ; when other disciples have for- 
saken Him and fled. 

We may be calling, in our blind unbelief, as 
we point to some ruined fabric of earthly bliss 
— some tomb which has become the grave of our 
fondest affections and dearest hopes — " Shall the 
dust praise thee, shall it declare thy truth?" Be- 
lieve! believe! God will not give us back our 
dead as He did to the Bethany sisters ; but He 
will not deprive us of aught we have, or suffer one 
garnered treasure to be removed, except for His 
own glory and our good. Now it is our province 
to believe it — in Heaven we shall see it. Before 
the sapphire throne we shall see that not one re- 
dundant thorn has been suffered to pierce our feet, 
or one needless sorrow to visit our dwelling or tear 
to dim our eye. Then our acknowledgment will 
be, " We have known and believed the love which 
God hath to us." 

€t Ob, weep not though, the beautiful decay, 

Thy heart must have its autumn — its pale skies 



32 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Leading mayhap to winter's cold dismay. 
Yet doubt not. Beauty doth not pass away ; 

His form departs not, though his body dies. 

Secure beneath the earth the snowdrop lies, 
Waiting the spring's young resurrection-day." * 

Be it ours to have Jesus with us, and Jesus for 
us, in all our afflictions. If we wish to insure 
these mighty solaces, we must not suffer the hour 
of sorrow and bereavement to overtake us with a 
Saviour till then a stranger and unknown. St 
Luke tells as the secret of Mary's faith and com* 
posure at her loved one's grave:- — She had, long 
before her day of trial, learned to sit at her Re- 
deemer } s feet. It was when in health Jesus was first 
resorted to and loved. 

In prosperity may our homes and hearts be 
gladdened with His footstep ; and when prosperity 
is withdrawn, and is succeeded by the dark and 
cloudy day, may we know, like Martha and Mary, 
where to rush in our seasons of bitter sorrow ; 
listening from His glorified lips on the throne to 
those same exalted themes of consolation which, 
for eighteen hundred years, have to myriad, 
myriad mourners been like oil thrown on the 

• « Within and Without." 



* 



LESSONS. 33 



troubled sea. Jesus is with us ! The Master is 
come ! His presence will extract sorrow from the 
bitterest cup ; and make ? as He did at Bethany, 
a very home of bereavement and a burial scene to 
be " hallowed ground 1" 



/ 



IV. 



Is the absent Saviour not to be sought? Martha 
and Mary knew the direction He had taken. The 
last time He had visited their home was at the 
Feast of Dedication ; daring the season of winter, 
when the palm-trees were bared of their leaves, 
and the voice of the turtle was silent. Jesus, on 
that occasion, had to escape the vengeance of the 
Jews in Jerusalem by a temporary retirement to 
the place where John first baptized, near Enon, 
on the wooded banks of the Jordan. It must 
have been to Him a spot and season of calm and 
grateful repose; a pleasing transition from the 
rude hatred and heartless formalism which met 
Him in the degenerate "City of Solemnities." 
The savour of the Baptist's name and spirit 
seemed to linger around this sequestered region. 






• THE MESSENGEK. 35 

John had evidently prepared, by his faithful 
minis try ? the way for a mightier Preacher, for we 
read, as the result of the Saviour's present so- 
journ, that u many "believed on Him there." 

If we visit with hallowed emotion the places 
where first we learned to love the Lord, to two at 
least of those who accompanied the Redeemer, the 
region He now traversed must have "been full of 
fragrant memories ; there it was that Jesus had 
been first pointed out to them as the " Lamb of 
God ; " there they first " beheld His glory, the 
glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full 
of grace and of truth." (John i. 28.) 

On His way thither, on the present occasion, 
He most probably passed through Bethany, and 
apprised His friends of His temporary absence. 
Lazarus was then in his wonted vigour- — no shadow 
of death had yet passed over his brow ; he doubt- 
less parted with the Lord he loved happy at the 
thought of ere long meeting again. 

But soon all is changed. The hand of sickness 
unexpectedly lays him low. At first there is no 
cause for anxiety. But soon the herald-symptoms 
of danger and death gather fast and thick around 






36 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

his pillow; "his beauty consumes away like a 
moth." The terrible possibility for the first time 
flashes across the minds of the sisters, of a desolate 
home, and of themselves being the desolate sur- 
vivors of a loved brother. The joyous dream of 
restoration becomes fainter and fainter. Human 
remedies are hopeless. There was One, and only 
One, in the wide world who could save from im- 
pending death. His word, they knew, could alone 
summon lustre to that eye, and bloom to that 
wan and fading cheek. Fifty long miles intervene 
between the great Physician and their cottage 
home. But they cannot hesitate. Some kind and 
compassionate neighbour is soon found ready to 
hasten along the Jericho road with the brief but 
urgent message, "Lord! behold he whom thou 
lovest is sick" If it only reach in time, they know 
that no more is needed. They even indulge the 
expectation that their messenger may be antici- 
pated by the Lord Himself appearing. Others 
might doubt His omniscience, but they knew its 
reality. They had the blessed conviction, that 
while they were seated in burning tears by that 
couch of sickness, there was a sympathising Being 



THE MESSENGER. 37 

far away marking every heart-throb of His suffer- 
ing friend. Even when the stern human conviction 
of " no hope " was pressing upon them, " hoping 
against hope," they must have felt confident that 
He would not suffer His faithfulness now to fail. 
He had often proved Himself a Brother and Friend 
in the hour of joy. Could He fail — can lie fail to 
prove Himself now a u Brother born for adver- 
sity?" 

Although, however, thus convinced that the tale 
of their sorrows was known to Jesus, a messenger 
is sent, — the means are employed! They act as 
though He knew it not; as if that omniscient 
Saviour had been all unconscious of these hours of 
prolonged and anxious agony ! 

What a lesson is there here for us! God is 
acquainted with our every trouble; He knows 
(far better than we know ourselves) every pang 
we heave, every tear we weep, every perplexing 
path we trea'd ; but the knee must be bent, the 
message must be taken, the prayer must ascend! 
It is His own appointed method, — His own conse- 
crated medium for obtaining blessings. Jesus may 
have gone, and probably would have gone to 



38 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

restore His friend, even though no such messenger 
had reached Him : We dare not limit the grace 
and dealings of God : He is often (blessed be His 
name for it !) " found of them that sought Him 
not." But He loyes such messages as this. He 
loves the confiding, childlike trust of His own 
people, who delight in the hour of their extremity 
to cast their burdens upon Him, and send the 
winged herald of prayer to the throne of grace 
on which He sits. 

Would that we valued, more than we do, this 
blessed link of communication between our souls 
and Heaven! More especially in our seasons of 
trouble, (when u vain is the help* of man,") happy 
for us to be able implicitly to rest in the ability 
and willingness of a gracious Redeemer. 

Prayer brings the soul near to Jesus, and fetches 
Jesus near to the soul. He may linger, as He did 
now at the Jordan, ere the answer be vouchsafed^ 
but it is for some wise reason; and even if the 
answer given be not in accordance with our pre- 
conceived wishes or anxious desires, yet how 
comforting to have put our case and all its per- 
plexities in His hand ; saying, " I am oppressed ; 



THE MESSENGER. 39 

undertake Thou for me ! To Thee I unburden 
and unbosom my sorrows. I shall be satisfied 
whether my cup be filled or emptied. Do to me 
as seemeth good in Thy sight He whom I love 
and whom Thou lovest is sick; the Lazarus of 
my earthly hopes and affections is hovering on the 
brink of death. That levelling blow, if consum- 
mated, will sweep down in a moment all my hopes 
of earthly happiness and joy. But it is my privilege 
to confide my trouble to Thee ; to know that I have 
surrendered myself and all that concerns me into 
the hand of Him who ' considers my soul in 
adversity.' Yes ; and should my schemes be 
crossed, and my fondest hopes baffled, I will feel, 
even in apparently Unanswered prayers, that the 
Judge of all the earth has done right !" 

" It is said," says Rutherford, speaking of the 
Saviour's delay in responding to the request of 
the Syrophenician woman; " It is said He an- 
swered not a word, but it is not said He heafd not 
a word. These two differ much. Christ often 
heareth when He doth not answer. His not an- 
swering is an answer, and speaks thus : f Pray on, 
go on and cry, for the Lord holdeth His door fast 



40 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

bolted — not to keep you out, but that you may 
knock and knock.' " 

u God delays to answer prayer/' says Arch- 
bishop Usher, " because he would have more of 
it. If the musicians come to play at our doors or 
our windows, if we delight not in their music, we 
throw them out money presently that they may be 
gone. But if the music please us, we forbear to 
give them money, because we would keep them ■ 
longer to enjoy their music. So the Lord loves 
and delights in the sweet words of His children, 
and therefore puts them off and answers them not 
presently." 

Observe still further, in the case of these sor- 
rowing sisters of Bethany, while in all haste and 
urgency they send their messenger, ■ they do not 
ask Jesus to come — they dictate no procedure — 
they venture on no positive request — all is left to 
Himself. What a lesson also is there here to con- 
fide in His wisdom, to feel that His way and His 
will must be the best — that our befitting attitude 
is to lie passive at His feet — to wait His righteous 
disposal of us and ours — to make this the burden 
of our petition, " Lord, what wouldst Thou have 



THE MESSENGER 41 

me to do ? M (c If it be possible let this cup pass 
from me, nevertheless } not as JT will, but as Thou 
mtk? ; \ t 

Keader ! invite to your gates this celestial mes- 
senger. Make prayer a holy habit — a cherished 
privilege. Seek to be ever maintaining intercom- 
munion with Jesus ; consecrating life's common 
duties with His favour and love. Day by day ere 
you take your flight into the world, night by 
night when you return from its soiling contacts, 
bathe your drooping plumes in this refreshing 
fountain. Let prayer sweeten prosperity and hal- 
low adversity. Seek to know the unutterable 
blessedness of habitual filial nearness to your 
Father in heaven — in childlike confidence un- 
bosoming to Him those heart-sorrows with which 
no earthly friend can sympathise, and with which 
a stranger cannot intermeddle. No trouble is too 
trifling to confide to His ear — no want too trivial 
to bear to His mercy-seat. 

tf Prayer is appointed to convey 

The blessings He designs to give ; 
Long as they live should Christians pray, 
For only while they pray, they live** 



/ 



V. 



The messenger has reached — what is his mes- 
sage ? It is a brief, but a beautiful one. a Lord 7 
behold he whom Thou lovest is sick" 

No laboured eulogium — no lengthened panegyric 
could have described more significantly the charac- 
ter of the dying villager of Bethany. Four mystic 
words invest his name with a sacred loveliness. 
By one stroke of his pen the Apostle unfolds a 
heart-historv : so that we desiderate no more — 
more would almost spoil the touching simplicity 
— u He whom Thou lovest!" 

We might think at first the words are inverted, 
Oan the messenger have mistaken them ? Is it 
not more likely the message of the sisters was 
this : — " Go and tell Him, • Lord, he whom we 
love/ or else, c he who loveth Thee is sick? ' " 



THE MESSAGE. 43 

Nay, it is a loftier argument by which, they 
would stir the infinite depths of the Fountain of 
love ! They had " known and believed the love" 
which the Great Redeemer bore to their brother, 
and they further felt assured that u loving him at 
the beginning, He would love him even to the 
end." Their love to Lazarus — (tender, unspeak- 
ably tender as it was — one of the loveliest types 
of human affection) — was at best an earthly love 
— finite — imperfect — fitful — changing — perishable. 
But the love they invoked was undying and ever- 
lasting, superior to all vacillation — enduring as 
eternity. 

It is ours u to take encouragement in prayer 
from God only ; " — to plead nothing of our own 
— our poor devotedness, or our unworthy services ; 
they are rather arguments for our condemnation ; — 
but His promises are all u Yea, and amen." They 
never fail. His name is " a strong tower," running 
into which the righteous are safe. That tower is 
garrisoned and bulwarked by the attributes of His 
own everlasting nature. Among these attributes 
not the least glorious is His Love — that unfathom- 
able love which dwelt in His bosom from all 



44 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

/ 

eternity, and which is immutably pledged never 
to "be taken from His people ! 

Man's love to his God is like the changing sand 
■ — His is like the solid rock. Man's love is like 
the passing ^meteor with its fitful gleam. His like 
the fixed stars, shining far above, clear and serene, 
from age to age, in their own changeless firmament. 

Do we know anything of the words of this 
message? Could it be written on our hearts in 
life? Were we to die, could it be inscribed on 
our tombs, " This is one whom Jesus loved? " 

Happy assurance ! The pure spirits who bend 
before the throne know no happier. The arch- 
angels — the chieftains among principalities and 
powers, can claim no higher privilege, no loftier 
badge of glory ! 

Love is the atmosphere they breathe. It is 
the grand moral law of gravitation in the heavenly 
economy. God, the central sun of light, and joy, 
and glory, keeping by this great motive principle 
every spiritual planet in its orbit, "for God is 
love." 

That love is not confined to heaven. It may 
be foretasted here. The sick man of Bethany 



t THE messag'e. 45 

knew of it, and exulted in it. Though in the 
moment of dissolution he had to mourn the per- 
sonal absence of his Lord, yet "believing" in that 
love, he " rejoiced with joy unspeakable and full 
of glory." His sisters, as they stood in sorrowing 
emotion by his dying couch, and thought of that 
hallowed fraternal bond which was about so soon 
to be dissolved, could triumph in the thought of 
an affection nobler and better which knit him and 
them to the Brother of brothers — and which, unlike 
any earthly tie, was indissoluble. 

And what was experienced in that lowly Bethany 
home, may be experienced by us. 

That love in its wondrous manifestation is con- 
fined to no limits, no age, no peculiar circum- 
stances. Many a Lazarus, pining in want, who 
can claim no heritage but poverty, no home but 
cottage walls, or who, stretched on a bed of pro- 
tracted sickness, is heard saying in the. morning, 
u Would God it were evening ! and in the evening, 
Would God it were morning !" if he have that love 
reigning in his heart, he has a possession outweigh- 
ing the wealth of worlds ! . 

What a message, too, of consolation is here to 



46 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. * 

the sick! How often are those chained down yea* 
after year to some aching pillow, worn, weary, 
shattered in body, depressed in spirit, — how apt 
are they to indulge in the sorrowful thought, 
" Surely God cannot care for meP What ! Jesus 
think of this wasted frame — these throbbing 
temples — these powerless limbs — -this decaying 
mind ! I feel like a wreck on the desert shore — 
beyond the reach of His glance — beneath the 
notice of His pitying eye ! Nay, thou poor de- 
sponding one, He does cherish, He does remember 
thee ! — u - Lord, lie whom Thou lovest is sick." 
Let this motto-verse be inscribed on thy Bethany 
chamber. The Lord loves His sick ones, and He 
often chastens them with sickness, just because 
He loves them. If these pages be now traced by 
some dim eyes that have been for long most 
familiar with the sickly glow of the night-lamp 
— the weary vigils of pain and languor and disease 
- — an exile from a busy world, or a still more 
unwilling alien from the holy services of the 
sanctuary— oh ! think of Him who loves thee, who 
loved thee into this sickness, and will love thee 
through it, till thou standest in that unsuffering, 



THE MESSAGE. 47 

unsorrowing world, where sickness is unknown! 
Think of Lazarus in his chamber, and the plea of 
the sisters in behalf of their prostrate brother, 
u Lord, come to the sick one, whom Thou lovest." 

Believe it, the very continuance of this sickness 
is a pledge of His love. You may be often 
tempted to say with Gideon, " If the Lord be 
with me, why has all this befallen me?" Surely 
if my Lord loyed me, He would long ere this have 
hastened to my relief, rebuked this sore disease, 
and raised me up from this bed of languishing ? 
Did you ever note, in the 6th verse of this Bethany 
chapter, the strangely beautiful connexion of the 
word thekefoke? The Evangelist had, in the 
preceding verse, recorded the affection Jesus bore 
for that honoured .family. " Now Jesus loved 
Martha and her sister and Lazarus." " When 
He had heard therefore that he was sick," — 
what did He do ? u Fled on wings of love to the 
succour of His loved friend ; hurried in eager haste 
by the shortest route from Bethabara?" We ex- 
pect to hear so, as the natural deduction from 
John's premises. How we might think could love 
give a more truthful exponent of its reality Jhan 



48 MEMOEIES OP BETHANY. 

hastening instantaneously to the relief of one so 
dear to Him ? But not so ! " When He had heard 
therefore that he was sick, He abode two days 
still in the same place where He was /' Yes, there 
is tarrying love as well as succouring love. He 
sent that sickness because He loves thee ; He con- 
tinues it because He loves thee. He heaps fresh 
fuel on the furnace-fires till the gold is refined. 
He appoints, not one, but " many days where 
neither sun nor stars appear, and no small tempest 
lies on us/' that the ship may be lightened, and 
faith exercised ; our bark hastened by these rough 
blasts nearer shore, and the Lord glorified, who 
rules the raging of the sea. " We expect," says 
Evans, " the blessing or relief in our way ; He 
chooses to bestow it in His." 

Reader ! let this ever be your highest ambition, 
to love and to be loved of Jesus. If we are covet- 
ous to have the regard and esteem of the great and 
good on earth, what is it to share the fellowship 
and kindness of Him, in comparison with whose 
love the purest earthly affection is but a passing 
shadow ! 

Ah ! to be without that love, is to be a little 



THE MESSAGE. 49 

world ungladdened by its central sun, wandering 
on in its devious pathway of darkness and gloom. 
Earthly things may do well enough when the 
world is all bright and shining — when prosperity 
sheds its bewitching gleam around you, and no 
symptoms of the cloudy and dark day are at 
hand ; but the hour is coming (it may come soon, 
it must come at some time) when your Bethany- 
home will be clouded with deepening death- 
shadows — when, like Lazarus, you will be laid 
on a dying couch, and what will avail you then? 
Oh, nothing, nothing ! if bereft of that love whose 
smile is heaven. If you are left in the agony of 
desolation to utter importunate pleadings to an 
Unknown Saviour , a Stranger God — if the dark 
valley be entered uncheered by the .thought of a 
loving Redeemer dispelling its gloom, and waiting 
on the Canaan side to shew you the path of life ! 

Let the home of your hearts be often open, as 
was the home of Lazarus, to the visits of Jesus in 
the day of brightness ; and then^ when the hour of 
sorrow and trial unexpectedly arises, you will 
know where to find your Lord — where to send 
your prayer-message for Him to come to your relief. 



50 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY, 

Yes! He will come! It will be in His own 
way, but His joyous footfall will be beard ! He 
is not like Baal, " slumbering and sleeping, or 
taking a journey" when the voice of importunate 
prayer ascends from the depths of yearning hearts I 
If, instead of at once hastening back to Bethany, 
He " abides still for two days where He was' 1 — 
if He linger among the mountain-glens of distant 
Gilead, instead of, as we would expect, hastening 
to the cry and succour of cherished friendship, and 
to ward off the dart of the inexorable foe — -be as- 
sured there must be a reason for this strange pro- 
crastination — there must be an unrevealed cause 
which the future will in due time disclose and un- 
ravel. All the recollections of the past forbid 
one unrighteous surmise on His tried faithfulness, 
u Now j Jesus loved Lazarus" is a soft pillow on 
\vhich to repose ; — raising the sorrowing . spirit 
above the unkind insinuation, " My Lord hath for- 
saken me, and my God hath forgotten me." 

If He linger, it is to try and test the faith of 
His people. If He let loose the storm, and suffer 
it to sweep with a vengeance apparently uncon- 
trolled, it is that these living trees may strike 






THE MESSAGE. 51 



their roots firmer and deeper in Himself — the 
Rock of eternal ages. Trust Him where you 
cannot trace Him. Not one promise of His can 
come to nought. The channel may have con- 
tinued long dry — the streams of Lebanon may 
have failed — the cloud has been laden, but.no 
shower descends — the barren waste is un watered 
— the windows of heaven seem hopelessly closed. 
Nay, nay ! Though " the vision tarry," yet if 
you " wait for it" the gracious assurance will be 
fulfilled in your experience — " The Lord is good 
to them that wait for Him, to the soul that seek- 
eth Him." The fountain of love pent up in His 
heart will in due time gush forth — the apparently 
unacknowledged prayer will be crowned with a 
gracious answer. In His own good time sweet 
tones of celestial music will be wafted to your ear 
— " It is the voice of the Beloved ! — lo, He cometh 
leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the 
hills ! " If you are indeed the child of God, as 
Lazarus was, remember this for your comfort in 
your dying hour, that whether the prayers of sor- 
rowing friends for your recovery be answered or 
no, the Lord of love has at least heard them — the 



52 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

messenger has not been mocked — the prayer-mes- 
sage has not been spurned or forgotten ! I repeat 
it, He will answer, but it will be in His own 
way! If the Bethany-borne be ungladdened by 
Lazarus restored, it will exult through tears in the 
thought of Lazarus glorified. And the Marthas 
and Marys, as they go often unto the grave to 
weep there, will read, as they weep, in the holy 
memories of the departed, that which will turn 
tears into joy — " Jesus loved himJ % 




VL 



* Bkt$a. 



11 Our friend Lazarus sleepeth." — The hopes and 
fears which alternately rose and fell in the bosoms 
of the sisters, like the surges of the ocean, are 
now at rest. Oft and again, we may well "believe, 
had they gone, like the mother of Sisera, to the 
lattice to watch the return of the messenger, or ? 
what was tetter, to hail their expected Lord. Gaz- 
ing on the pale face at their side, and remembering 
that ere now the tidings of his illness must have 
reached Bethabara, they may have even expected 
to witness the power, of a distant word; — to behold 
the hues of returning health displacing the ghastly 
symptoms of dissolution. But in vain ! The 
curtain has fallen ! Their season of aching 
anxiety is at an end. Their worst fears are rea- 
lised. — " Lazarus sleepeth." 



54 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

How cairn, how tranquil that departure ! iSTevei 
did sun sink so gently in its crimson couch — 
never did child, nestling in its mother's bosom, 
close its eyes more sweetly ! 

€t His summon'd breath went forth as peacefully 
As folds the spent rose when the day is done." 

Befitting close to a calm and noiseless exist- 
ence! It would seem as if the guardian angels 
who had been hovering round his death-pillow 
had well-nigh reached the gates of glory ere the 
sorrowing survivors discovered that the clay taber- 
nacle was all that was left of a " brother be- 
loved!" 

From the abrupt manner in which, in the course 
of the narrative, our Lord makes the announce- 
ment to His disciples,* we are almost led to surmise 
that He did so at the very moment of the spirit's 
dismissal — the Redeemer speaks while the eyelids 
ai<e just closing, and the emancipated soul is wing- 
ing its arrowy flight up to the spirit-land ! 

Death a Sleep ! — How beautiful the image ! 
Beautifully true, and only true regarding the Chris- 
tian, It is here where the true and the false—* 

* John xi. 11. 



THE SLEEPER. 55 

■ 

Christianity and Paganism — meet together in im- 
pressive and significant contrast. The one comes 
to the dark river with her pale, sickly lamp. It 
refuses to burn — the damps of Lethe dim and 
quench it. Philosophy tries to discourse on death 
as a "stern necessity" — of the duty of passing 
heroically into this mysterious, oblivion-world — 
taking with bold heart " the leap in the dark/' 
and confronting, as we best can, blended images 
of annihilation and terror. 

The Gospel takes us to the tomb, and shews 
us Death vanquished, and the Grave spoiled. 
Death truly is in itself an unwelcome messenger 
at our door. It is the dark event in this our earth, 
— the deepest of the many deep shadows of an 
otherwise fair creation — a cold, cheerless avalanche 
lying at the heart of humanity, freezing up the 
gushing fountains of joyous life. But the Gospel 
shines, and the cold iceberg melts. The Sun of 
Righteousness effects what philosophy, with all 
its. boasted power, never could. Jesus is the 
abolisher of Death. He has taken ail that is 
terrible from it. It is said of some venomous 
insects that when they once inflict a sting, they 



56 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

are deprived of any future power to hurt. Death 
left his euvenomed sting in the body of the great 
Victim of Calvary. It was thenceforward disarmed 
of its fearfulness ! So complete, indeed, is the 
Redeemer's victory over this last enemy, that He 
Himself speaks of it as no longer a reality, but a 
shadow — a phantom -foe from which we have 
nothing to dread. " Whosoever believeth in Me 
shall never die" u If a man keep My sayings, he 
shall never see death" These are an echo of the 
sweet Psalmist's beautiful words, a transcript of his 
expressive figure when he pictures the Dark Valley 
to the believer as the Valley of a u shadow" 
The substance is removed ! When the gaunt 
.spirit meets him on the midnight waters, he 
may, like the disciples at first, be led to " cry out 
for fear." But a gentle voice of love and tender- 
ness rebukes his dread, and calms his misgivings 
— "It is I! be not afraid!" Yes, here is the 
wondrous secret of a calm departure — the "sleep" of 
the believer in death. It is the name and presence 
of Jesus. There may be many accompaniments of 
weakness and prostration, pain and suffering, in 
that final conflict j the mind may be a wreck*— 



THE SLEEPER. 57 

memory may have abdicated her seat — the loving 
salutation of friends may be returned only with 
vacant looks, and the hand be unable to acknow- 
ledge the grasp of affection — but there is strength 
in that presence, and music in that name to dispel 
e^ery disquieting, anxious thought. Clung to as 
a sheet-anchor in life, He will never leave the 
soul in the hour of dissolution to the mercy of 
the storm. Amid sinking nature, He is faithful 
that promised — " Lo, I am w r ith you alway, even 
unto the end of the world." — u Thou art with 
me/' says Lady Powerscourt — "this is the rain- 
bow of light thrown across the valley, for there is 
no need of sun or moon where covenant-love 
illumes." 

A Christian's death-bed ! It is indeed " good to 
be there." The man who has not to seek a living 
Saviour at a dying hour, but who, long having 
known His preciousness, loved His Word, valued 
His ordinances, sought His presence by believing 
prayer, has now nothing to do but to die (to sleep) , 
and wake up in glory* everlasting ! u Oh ! that 
all my brethren," were among Rutherford's last 
words, u may know what a Master I have served, 



58 MEMOBIES OP BETHANY. 

and what peace I have this day. This night shall 
close the door, and put my anchor within the veil." 
"This must be the chariot/' said Helen Plumtre, 
making use of Elijah's translation as descriptive of 
the believer's death ; " This must be the chariot ; 
oh, how easy it is ! " " Almost well," said Richard 
Baxter, when asked on his deathbed how he did. 

Yes! there is speechless eloquence in such a 
scene. The figure of a quiet slumber is no hyper- 
bole, but a sober verity. As the gentle smile of a 
foretasted heaven is seen playing on the marble 
lips — the rays gilding the mountain tops after the 
golden sun has gone down — what more befitting 
reflection than this, " So giveth He His beloved 
SLEEP ! " 

" Sweetly remembering that the parting sigh 
Appoints His saints to slumber, not to die, 
The starting tear we check — we kiss the rod, 
And not to earth resign them, but to God." 

Or shall we leave the death-chamber and visit 
the grave? Still it is a place of sleep ; a bed of 
rest — a couch of tranquil repose — a quiet dormi- 
tory " until the day break," and the night shadows 
of earth " flee away." The dust slumbering there 



THE SLEEPER. 59 

is precious because redeemed ; the angels of God 
have it in custody; they encamp round about it, 
waiting the mandate to " gather the elect from the 
four winds of heaven — from the one end of heaven 
to the other." Oh, wondrous day, when the long 
dishonoured casket shall be raised a " glorified 
body ' to receive once more the immortal jewel, 
polished and made meet for the Master's use! 
See how Paul clings, in speaking of this glorious 
resurrection period, to the expressive figure of his 
Lord before him — " Them also which sleep in 
Jesus will God bring with Him ! ' Sleep in Jesus ! 
His saints fall asleep on their death-couch in His 
arms of infinite love. There their spirits repose, 
until the body, "sown in corruption " shall be " raised 
in incorruption," and both reunited in the day of 
His appearing, become " a crown of glory in the 
hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand 
of their God." 

Weeping mourner ! Jesus dries thy tears with 
the encouraging assurance, " Thy dead shall live ; 
together with My body they shall arise." Let thy 
Lazarus "sleep on now and take his rest ; " the time 
will come when My voice shall be heard proclaim- 



60 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

ing, "Awake, and sing, ye that dwell in' dust." 
"The winter is past, the rain is over and gone, 
the flowers appear on the earth : the time of the * 
singing of birds is come, and the voice of the 
turtle is heard in the land. Arise, my love, my 
fair one, and come away." " Weep not! he is not 
dead, but sleepeth. Soon shall the day-dawn 
of glory streak the horizon, and then I shall 
go that I may awake him out of sleep ! " 

Beautifully has it been said, " Dense as the 
gloom is which hangs over the mouth of the 
sepulchre, it is the spot, above all others, where 
the Gospel, if it enters, shines and triumphs. In 
' the busy sphere of life and health, it encounters 
an active antagonist — the world confronts it, aims 
to obscure its glories, to deny its claims, to drown 
its voice, to dispute its progress, to drive it from 
the ground it occupies. But from the mouth of 
the grave the world retires ; it shrinks from the 
contest there ; it leaves a clear and open space .in 
which the Gospel can assert its claims and unveil 
its glories without opposition or fear. There the 
infidel and worldling look anxiously around — but 
the world has left them helpless, and fled. There 



THE SLEEPER. 61 

th* Christian looks around, and lo ! the angel, of 
mercy is standing close by his side. The Gospel 
kindles a torch which not only irradiates the valley 
of the shadow of death, but throws a radiance 
into the world beyond, and reveals it peopled 
with the sainted spirits of those who have died 
in Jesus." 

Reader ! may this calm departure be yours and 
mine. " Blessed are the dead which die in the 

Lord They eest." All life's turmoil and 

tossing is over; they are anchored in the quiet 
haven. Rest — but not the rest of annihilation — 

" Grave ! the guardian of our dust ; 
Grave ! the treasury of the skies ; 
Every atom of thy trust 

Rests in hope again to rise ! " 

Let us seek to have the eye of faith fixed and 
centred on Jesus now. It is that which alone 
can form a peaceful pillow in a dying hour, and 
enable us to rise superior to all its attendant 
terrors. Look at that scene in the Jehoshaphat 
valley! The protj-martyr Stephen has a pillow 
of thorns for his dying couch, showers of stones 
are hurled by infuriated murderers on his guiltless 
head, yet, nevertheless, he "fell asleep." What 



t 



62 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

was tlie secret of that calmest of sunsets amid a 
blood-stained and storm- wreathed sky? The eye 
of faith (if not of sight) pierced through those 
clouds of darkness. Far above the courts of the 
material temple at whose "base he lay, he beheld, 
in the midst of the general assembly and Church 
of the First-born of Heaven, " Jesus standing at 
the right hand of Grod." The vision of his Lord 
was like a celestial lullaby stealing from the inner 
sanctuary. With Jesus, his last sight on earth 
and his next in glory, he could " lay him down 
in peace and sleep/' saying, in the words of the 
sweet singer of Israel, " What time I awake I 
am still with Thee." 

** It matters little at what hour o* the day 

The righteous falls asleep. Death cannot come 
To him untimely who is fit to die. 
The less of this cold world the more of heaven ; 
The briefer life, the earlier immortality." — Milman. 

U Oar friend Lazarus sleepeth." This tells 

us that Christ forgets not the dead. The dead 

• often bury their dead, and remember them no 

more. The name of their silent homes has passed 

into a proverb, u The land of forgetfulness." But 



THE SLEEPER. 63 

they are not forgotten by Jesus. That which 
sunders and dislocates all other ties — wrenching 
brother from brother, sister from sister, friend 
from friend — cannot sunder us from the living, 
loving heart on the throne of heaven. His is 
a friendship and love stronger than death, and 
surviving death. While the language of earth is 

" Friend after friend departs — 
Who hath not lost a friend ] " 

the emancipated spirit, as it wings its magnificent 
flight among the ministering seraphim, can utter 
the challenge, "Who shall separate me from the 
love of Christ?" The righteous are had with 
Him " in everlasting remembrance." Their names 
"written among the living in Jerusalem j" yea, 
" engraven on the palms of His hands." 

One other thought. — Jesus had at first kindly 
and considerately disguised from His disciples the 
stern truth of Lazarus' departure. " Our friend 
sleepeth." " They thought that He had spoken of 
taking of rest in sleep." They understood it as the 
indication of the crisis-hour in sickness when the 
disease has spent itself, and is succeeded by a 
balmy slumber — the presage of returning health ; 



64 MEMORIES OP BETHANY. 

but now He says unto them plainly, " Lazarus is 
dead." How gently He thus breaks the sad in- 
telligence! And it is His method of dealing still. 
He prepares His people for their hours of trial. 
He does not lay upon them more than they are 
able to bear. He considers their case — He teaches 
by slow and gradual discipline, leading on step 
by step ; staying His rough wind in the day of 
His east wind. As the Good Physician, He metes 
out drop by drop in the bitter cup — as the Good 
Shepherd, His is not rough driving, bat gentle 
guiding from pasture to pasture. " He leadeth 
them out;" "He goeth before them." He is 
Himself their sheltering rock in the " dark and 
cloudy day." The sheep who are inured to the 
hardships of the mountain, He leaves at times to 
wrestle with the storm ; but " the lambs" (the young, 
the faint, the weak, the weary) u He gathers in His 
arms and carries in His bosom." He speaks in 
gentle whispers. He uses the pleasing symbol of 
quiet slumber before He speaks plainly out the 
mournful reality, " Lazarus is dead." Truly 
" He knoweth our frame — He remembereth that 
we are dust." u Like as a father pirieth his 



THE SLEEPER. 65 

children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear 
Him ! " 

But let ns resume our narrative, and follow the 
jojurney of the dead man's " Friend." It is a 
mighty task He has undertaken ; to storm the 
strong enemy in his own citadel, and roll hack 
the Tbarred gates ! In mingled majesty and ten- 
derness He hastens to the bereft and desolate 
home on this mission of power and love. We left 
the sisters wondering at His mysterious delay. 
Again and again had they imagined 'that at last 
they heard His tardy step, or listened to His hand 
on the latch, or to the loving -music of His longed- 
for voice. But they are mistaken ; it was only the 
heating of the vine-tendrils on the lattice, or the 
footfall of the passer by. The Lord is still ab- 
sent ! Their earnest and importunate heart- 
breathings are expressed by the Psalmist — " O 
Lord our God, early do we seek Thee : our soul 
thirsteth for Thee, our flesh longeth for Thee in 
a dry and thirsty land, where no water is ; to see 
Thy power and Thy glory, as we have seen Thee.'* 
Be still, afflicted ones ! He is coming. He will, 
however, let the cup of anguish be first filled to 



66 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

the Tbrim that He may manifest and magnify all 
the more the might of His omnipotence, and the 
marvels of His compassion. The thirsty land is 
about to become streams of water. The sky is- at 
its darkest, when, lo ! the rainbow of love is seen 
spanning the firmament, and a shower of*blessings 
is about to fall on the " Home of Bethany I" 






The sounds of lamentation had now been heard 
for four days in the desolate household. 

In accordance with general Wont, the friends 
and relatives of the deceased had assembled to 
pay their tribute of respect to the memory of a 
revered friend, and to solace the hearts of the dis- 
consolate survivors. They needed all the sym- 
pathy they received. It was now the dull dead 
calm after the torture of the storm, the leaden 
sea, strewn with wrecks, enabling them to realise 
more fully the extent of their loss. Amid the 
lulls of the tempest, while Lazarus yet lived, 
hope shrunk from entertaining gloomy apprehen- 
sions. But now that the storm has spent its fury, 
now that the worst has come, the future rises 
tip before them crowded with ten thousand images 



68 MEMOKIES OP BETHANY. 

of desolation and sorrow. The void in their house- 
hold is daily more and more felt. All the past 
"bright memories of Bethany seem to be buried 
in a yawning grave. 

We may picture the scene. The stronger and 
more resolute spirit of Martha striving to stem 
the tide of overmuch sorrow. The more sensitive 
heart of Mary, bowed under a grief too deep for 
utterance, able only to indicate by her silent teais 
the unknown depths 'of her sadness. 

Thus are they employed, when Martha, unseen 
to her sister, has been beckoned away, " Tlie 
Master has come." But desirous of ascertaining 
the truth of the joyful tidings, ere intruding on 
the grief of Mary, the elder of the survivors 
rushes forth with trembling emotion to give full 
vent to her sorrow at -the feet of the Great Friend 
of all the friendless ! * 

He has not yet entered the village. ' She can- 
not, however, wait His arrival. Leaving home 
and sepulchre behind, she hastens outside the 
groves of palm at its gate. 

It requires no small fortitude in' the season of 

* John xi. 20. 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS. 69 



Bore bereavement to face an altered world ; and, 
doubtless, passing all alone now through the little 
town, meeting familiar faces wearing sunny smiles 
which could not be returned, must have been a 
painful effort to this child of sorrow. But what 
will the heart not do to meet such a Comforter ? 
What will Martha be unprepared to encounter if 
the intelligence brought her be indeed confirmed ? 
One glance is enough. " It is the Lord/" In a 
moment she is a suppliant at His feet. Doubt 
and faith and prayer mingle in the exclamation, 
" Lord, if Thou haclst been here, my brother had 
not died ! " * 

That she had faith and assured confidence in 
the love and tenderness of Jesus we cannot ques- 
tion. But a momentary feeling of unbelief (shall 
we say, of reproach and upbraiding ?) mingled with 
better emotions. "Why, Lord," seemed to be the 
expression of her inner thoughts, u wert Thou 
absent ? It was unlike Thy kind heart. Thou 
hast often gladdened our home in our season of 
joy— why this forgetfulness in the night of our 
letter agony? Death has torn from us a loved 

* John xi. 21. 



70 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

"brother — the blow would have been spared — these 
hearts Avould have been unbroken — these burning 
tears unshed, if Thou hadst been here ! " 

Such was the bold — the unkind reasoning of the 
mourner. It was the reasoning of a finite crea- 
ture. Ah ! if she could but have looked into the 
woi kings of that infinite Heart she was ungene- 
rously upbraiding, how differently would she have 
broached her tearful suit ! 

Her exclamation is— " Why this unkind ab- 
sence?" 

His comment on that same absence to His 
disciples is this — " I was glad for your sakes 
that I was not there ! " 

How often are God and man thus in strange 
antagonism, with regard to earthly dispensations ! 
Man, as he arraigns the rectitude of the Divine 
procedure, exclaiming — " How unaccountable this 
dealing ! How baffling this mystery ! "Where is 
now my God?" This sickness — why prolonged? 
This thorn in the flesh — why still buffeting ? This 
family blank — why permitted? Why the most 
treasured and useful life taken — the blow aimed 
where it cut most severely and levelled lowest ? 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS. 71 

Hush the secret atheism ! This trial, whatever 
it be, has this grand motto written upon it in 
characters of Hying light j — we can read it on 
anguished pillows — aching hearts — ay, on the very 
.portals of the tomb — " This is for the glory of 
God, that the Son of God may be glorified there- 

hyi" 

At the very moment we are mourning what are 
called " dark providences" — " untoward calami- 
ties" — -■ strokes of misfortune" — " unmitigated 
evils" — Jesus has a different verdict ; — u I am 
glad for your sakes." 

The absence at Jordan — the still more unac- 
countable lingering for two days in the same 
place after the message had been sent ? instead of 
hastening direct to Bethany, all was well and 
wisely ordered. And although Martha's upbraid- 
ings were now received in forbearing silence, her 
Saviour afterwards, in a calmer moment, read the 
rebuke — " Said I not unto thee, if thou wouldst 
believe, thou shouldst see the glory of God?" 

It is indeed a comforting assurance in all trials, 
that God has some holy and wise end to sub- 
serve, He never stirs a ripple on the waters, 



72 MEMOBTES OF BETHANY. 

but for His own glory, or the gopd of others. 
The delay on the present occasion, though pro- 
tracting for a time the sorrows of the bereaved, 
was intended for the benefit of the Church in every 
age r and for the more immediate benefit of the 
disciples. 

They were destined in a few brief weeks also to 
be desolate survivors — to mourn a Brother dearer 
still ! He who had been to them Friend — Father 
- — Brother, all in one, was to be, like Lazarus, 
laid silent in a Jerusalem sepulchre. The Lord 
of Life was to be the victim of Death ! His body 
was to be transfixed to a malefactor's cross, and 
consigned to a lonely grave ! He knew the shock 
that awaited their faith. He knew, as this ter- 
rible hour drew on, how needful some overpower- 
ing visible demonstration would be of His mastery 
over the tomb. 

Now a befitting opportunity occurred in the case 
of their friend Lazarus to read the needed lesson. 
*' I was glad for your sakes, ... to the intent ye 
might believe." 

Would that we could feel as believers more 
than we do — that the dealings of our God are 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS. 73 

for the strengthening of our faith, and the enliven- 
ing and invigorating of our spiritual graces. Let 
us seek to accept more simply in dark dealings the 
Saviour's explanation, " It is for your sake!" He 
gives us a blank for our every trial, indorsing it 
with His own gracious word, " This, this is for 
the glory of God, that the Son of God may be 
glorified thereby." 

The words of Martha, then, surely teach as 
their great lesson, never to be hasty in our sur- 
mises and conclusions regarding God's ways. 

"Lord! IF Thou hadst been here?" Could 
she question for a moment that that loving eye of 
Omniscience had all the while been scanning that 
sick-chamber — marking every throb in that fevered 
brow — and every tear that fell unbidden from the 
eyes that watched his pillow ? 

" Lord ! if Thou hadst been here ?" Could 
she question His ability, had He so willed it, 
to prevent the bereavement altogether — to put an 
arrest on the hand of death ere the bow was 
strung ? 

faithless disciple, wherefore didst thou doubt? 
But thou art ere long to learn what each of us 



74 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

will learn out in eternity, that " all things are 
for our sakes, that the abundant grace might, 
through the thanksgiving of many, redound to the 
glory of Qod" 

at- 

But the momentary cloud has passed. Faith 
breaks through. The murmur of upbraiding has 
died away. He who listens makes allowance for 
an anguished heart. The glance of tender sym- 
pathy and gentleness which met Martha's eye, at 
once hushes all remains of unbelief. Words of 
exulting confidence immediately succeed. " But 
I know that even now. whatsoever Thou wilt ask 
of God, God will give it Thee." 

What i#tkis, but that which every believer 
exults in to this hour, as the sheet-anchor of hope 
and peace and comfort, when tossed on a tempes- 
tuous sea — a gracious confidence in the ability 
and willingness of Christ to save. T]ie Friend of 
Bethany is still the Friend in Heaven. To Him 
li all power has been committed;' "as a prince 
He has power with God, and must prevail." 

Yes, gracious antidote to the spirit in the 
moment of its trial j when bowed down with 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS. 75 

anticipated bereavement ; the curtains of death 
about to fall over life's brightest joys. Ho^ 
blessed to lay hold on the perfect conviction thai 
u the Ever-living Intercessor in glory has all 
power to revoke the sentence if He sees meet' 1 
■ — that even now (yes noio, in a moment) the 
delegated angel may be sent speeding from his 
throne, to spare the tree marked to fall, and pro- 
long the lease of existence ! 

Let us rejoice in the power of this God-man 
Mediator, that He ml as able as He is willing, and 
as willing as He is able.. " Him the Father 
heareth always." " Father 7 I will" is His own 
divine formula for every needed boon for His 
people. 

How it ought to make our sick-chambers and 
death-chambers consecrated to prayer ! leading us 
to make our every trial and sorrow a fresh reason 
for going to God. Laying our burden, whatever ** 
it may be, on the mercy-seat, it will be con- 
sidered by Him, who is too wise to grant what is 
better to be withdrawn, and too kind to withhold 
what, without injury to us, may be granted. 

Let us imitate Martha's faith in our approaches 



76 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

to Him. Ah, in our dull and cold devotions, how 
little lively apprehension have we of the gracious 
willingness of Christ to listen to our petitions ! 
Standing as the great Angel of the Covenant with 
the golden censer, His hand never shortened — His 
ear never heavy — His uplifted arm of intercession 
never faint. No variety bewildering Him — no im- 
portunity wearying Him — "waiting to be gracious" 
— loving the music of the suppliant spirit. 

Would that we had ever before us as the super- 
scription of faith written on our closet-devotions, 
and domestic altars, and public sanctuaries, when- 
ever and wherever the knee is bent, and the Hearer 
of prayer is invoked- — " I know that even now 
whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give it 
Thee." 



vin. 

Martha's tearful utterances are now met with an 
exalted solace. 

a Thy Irotlier shall rise again? It is the first 
time her Lord has spoken. She now once more 
hears those well-remembered tones which were last 
listened to, when life was all bright, and her home 
all happy. 

It is the self-same consolation which steals still, 
like celestial music, to the smitten heart, when 
every chord of earthly gladness ceases to vibrate. 
And it is befitting too that Jesus should utter it. 
He alone is qualified to do so. The words spoken 
to the bereaved one of Bethany are words pur- 
chased by His own atoning work. " Thy brother 
—thy sister — thy friend, shall rise again ! " 

This brief oracle of comfort was addressed, in 



'} 3 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY. 

the first instance ; specially to Martha. It had a 
primary reference, doubtless, to the vast miracle 
which was on the eve of performance, But there 
were more hearts to comfort and souls to cheer 
than one ; that Almighty Saviour had at the mo- 
ment troops of other bereaved ones in view; myriads 
on myriads of aching, bleeding spirits who could 
not, like the Bethany mourner, rush into His 
visible presence for consolation and peace. He 
expands, therefore, for their sakes the sublime and 
exalted solace which He ministers to her. And in 
words which have carried their echoes of hope 
and joy through all time, He exclaims — " I am the 
resurrection and the life ; he that believeth on Me, 
though he were dead, yet shall he live ; and whoso- 
ever liveth and believeth on Me shall never die ! ' 
If Bethany had bequeathed no other " memory " 
than this, how its name would have been em- 
balmed in hallowed recollection ! Truly these 
two brief verses are as apples of gold in pictures 
of silver. " Jesus , the Resurrection and the Life." 
Himself conquering death, He has conquered it for 
His people — opening the kingdom of heaven to 
all believers. 






THE MOURNERS COMFORT. 79 

The full grandeur of that Bethany utterance could 
not be appreciated by her to whom it was first 
spoken. His death and resurrection was still, even 
to His nearest disciples, a profoundmysteiy. Little 
did that trembling spirit, who was now gazing on 
her living Lord with tearful eye, dream that in a 
few brief days the grave was to hold Him, too, as 
its captive ; and that guardian angels were to 
proclaim words which would now have been all 
enigma and strangeness, " The Lord is risen ! " 
With us it is different. The mighty deed 
has been completed. " Christ has died; yea, 
rather has risen again ! " The resurrection and 
revival of Lazarus was a marvellous act, but it 
was only the rekindling of a little star that had 
ceased to twinkle in the firmament. A week 
more— and Martha would witness the Great Sun 
of all Being undergoing an eclipse ; in a mys- 
terioois moment veiled and shrouded in darkness 
and blood ; and then all at once coming forth 
like a Bridegroom from his chamber to shine 
the living and luminous centre of ransomed mil- 
lions ! 

Christians ! we can turn now aside and see this 






80 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

great sight — death closing the lips of the Lord of 
life — a borrowed grave containing the tenantiess 
tody of the Creator of all worlds ! Is death to 
hold that prey ? Is the grave to retain in gloomy 
custody that immaculate frame? Is the living 
temple to lie there an inglorious ruin, like other 
crumbling wrecks of mortality? The question of 
our eternal life or eternal death was suspended on 
the reply ! If death succeeds in chaining down 
the illustrious Victim, our hopes of everlasting life 
are gone for ever. In vain can these dreary por- 
tals be ever again unbarred for the children of 
fallen humanity. He has gone there as their 
surety-Saviour. If his suretyship be accepted — if 
He meet and fulfil all the requirements of an out- 

J. 

raged law, the gates of the dismal prison-house 
will and must be opened. If, on the other hand, 
there be any flaw or deficiency in His person or 
work as the Kinsman-Redeemer, then no power 
can snap the chains which bind Him; the tomb 
will refuse to surrender what it has in custody ; 
the hopes of His people must perish along with 
Him ! Golgotha must become the grave of a 
world's hopes ! 



THE MOUENEE's COMFOET. 81 

But the stone has been rolled away. The 
grave-clothes are all that are left as trophies of the 
conqueror. Angels are seated in the vacant tomb 
to verify with their gladdening assurance His own 
Bethany oracle, "The Lord has risen." "He is 
indeed the resurrection and the life ; he that liveth 
and believeth on Him shall never die ! " 

Yes ! however many be the comforting thoughts 
which cluster around the grave of Lazarus, grander 
still is it to gather, as Jesus Himself here bids us, 
around His own tomb, and to gaze on His own 
resurrection scene ! It was the most eventful 
morning of all time. It will be the focus point 
of the Church's hope and triumph through all 
eternity. 

" The Lord is risen! 7 It proclaimed the atone- 
ment complete, sin pardoned, mediation accepted, 
the law satisfied, God glorified ! " The Lord is 
risen ! n It proclaimed resurrection and life for His 
people — life (the forfeited gift of life) now repur- 
chased. That mighty victor rose not for Himself, 
but as the representative and earnest of countless 
multitudes, who exult in His death as their life — 
in His resurrection as the pledge and guarantee of 



82 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

• 

their everlasting safety ; — " I am He that livetk/ 5 
and " because I live ye shall live also." 

Anticipating His own glorious rising, He might 
well speak to Martha, standing before Him as 
the .representative of weeping, sinful, woe-worn 
humanity, " He that liveth and belie veth on Me 
shall never die." u In Me, death is no longer death; 
it is only a parenthesis in life — a transition to a 
loftier stage of being. In Me, the grave is the 
vestibule of heaven, the robing-room of immor- 
tality! " 

Reader, yours is the same strong consolation. 
"Believe," " Only believe" in that risen Lord. 
He has purchased all, paid all, procured ail ! 
Look into that vacant tomb ; see sin cancelled, 
guilt blotted out, the law magnified, justice 
honoured, the sinner saved ! 

Ay, and more than that, as you see the moral 
conqueror marching forth clothed with immortal 
victory, you see Him not alone ! He is heading 
and heralding a multitude which no man can 
number. Himself the victorious precursor, he is 
shewing to these exulting thousands " the path of 
life." He tells them to dread neither for themselves 



THE MOURNER'S COMFORT. S3 

or others that lonesome tomb. The curse is ex- 
tracted from it ; the envenomed sting is plucked 
away. In passing through its lonesome chambers 
they may exult in the thought that a mightier 
than they has sanctified it by His own presence, 
m and transmuted what was once a gloomy portico 
into a triumphal arch, bearing the inscription, " O 
death, I will be thy plagues ; grave, I will be thy 
destruction!" 



IX. 



How stands our faith ? 

These mighty thoughts and words of consola- 
tion — are they really "believed, felt, trusted in, re- 
joiced over ? 

Christian, "Believest thou this?"* Art thou 
really looking to this exalted life-giving Saviour ? 
Hast thou in some feeble measure realised this 
resurrection-life as thine own? Hast thou the 
joyful consciousness of participating in this vital 
union with a living Lord? In vain do we listen 
to these sublime Bethany utterances unless we feel 
" Jesus speaks to me" and unless we be living 
from day to day under their invigorating power. 

He had unfolded to Martha in a single verse a 
whole Gospel ; He had irradiated by a few words 

* John xi. 26. 



THE MOURNER'S CREED. 85 

» 

the darkness of the tomb ; and now, turning to the 
poor dejected weeper at his side, He addresses the 
all-important question, " Believest thou this? " 

Her faith had been but a moment before stag- 
gering. Som£ guilty misgivings had been ming- 
ling with her anguished tears. She has now an 
opportunity afforded of rising above her doubts ; — the 
ebbings and Sowings of her fitful feelings, — and 
cleaving fast to the Living Rock. 

It elicits an unfaltering response — " Yea, Lord, I 
believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, 
which should come into the world." * 

Remarkable confession ! We should not so 
much have wondered to hear it after the grave, 
hard by, had been rifled, and the silent lips of 
Lazarus had been unsealed ; or had she stood like 
the other Mary at her Lord's own sepulchre in the 
garden, and after a few brief, but momentous days 
and hours, seen a whole flood of light thrown on 
the question of His Messiahship. 

But as yet there was much to damp such a bold 
confession, and lead to hesitancy ki the avowal 
of such a creed. The poverty, the humiliations, 

* John xi. 27. 



86 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

the unworldly obscurity of that solitary One who 
claimed no earthly "birthright, and owned no 
earthly dwelling, were not all these, particularly 
to a Jew, at variance with every idea formed in 
connexion with the coming Shiloh ? 

Was Martha's then a blind unmeaning faith? 
Far from it/ It was nurtured, doubtless, in that 
quiet home of holy love,- where, while Lazarus 
yet lived, this mysterious Being, in an earthly 
form and in pilgrim garb, came time after time 
discoursing to them often, as we are warranted to 
believe, on the dignity of His nature, the glories 
of His person, the completeness of His work. It 
was neither the evidence- of miracle or prophecy 
which had revealed to that weeping disciple that 
Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. With 
the exception of Micah's statement regarding Beth- 
lehem-Ephratah as His birthplace, we question if 
any other remarkable prediction concerning Him 
had yet been fulfilled ; and so far as miracles were 
concerned, though she may and must have doubt- 
less known of them by hearsay, we have no evi- 
dence that she had as yet so much as witnessed one* 
We never read till this time of their quiet village 



the mouenee's ceeed. 87 

being the scene of any manifestations of His power. 
These had generally taken place either in Jeru- 
salem or in the cities and coasts of Galilee. The 
probability, therefore, is that Martha had never 
yet seen that arm of Omnipotence bared, or wit- 
nessed those prodigies with which elsewhere He 
authenticated His claims to Divinity. 

Whence then her creed? May we not believe 
she had made her noble avowal mainly from the 
study of that beauteous, spotless character — from 
those looks, and words, and deeds — from that lofty 
teaching — so unlike every human system — fco won- 
drously adapted to the wants and woes, the sins, 
the sorrows, and aching necessities of the human 
heart. All this had left on her own spirit, and on 
that of Lazarus and Mary, the -irresistible impres- 
sion and evidence that he was indeed the Lord 
of Glory — " the Hope of Israel, and the Saviour 
thereof." 

And is it not the same evidence we exult in 
still? Is this not the reason of many a humble 
believer's creed and faith — who may be all unlet- 
tered and unlearned in the evidences of the schools 
— -the external and internal bulwarks of our im- 



» 



88 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

pregnable Christianity? Ask them why they be- 
lieve ? why their faith is so firm — their love so 
strong ? 

They will tell you that that Saviour, in all 
the glories of His person, in all the completeness 
of His work, in all the beauties of His cha- 
racter, is the very Saviour they need ! — that His 
Gospel is the very errand of mercy suited to 
their souls' necessities ; — that His words of com- 
passion, and tenderness, and hope, are in every 
way adapted to meet the yearnings of their long- 
ing spirits. They need to stand by the grave of 
no Lazarus to be certified as to His Messiahship. 
His looks and tones — His character and doctrine, 
— His cures and remedies for the wants and woes 
of their ruined natures, point Him out as the true 
Heavenly Physician. 

They can tell of the best of all evidences, and 
the stiongest of all' — the experimental evidence! 
They are no theorists. Religion is no subject with 
them of barren speculation ; it is a matter of inner 
arid heartfelt experience. Th'ey have tried the cure 
■ — they have found it answer ; — they have fled to 
the Physician — they have applied His balm — they 



THE MOURNER'S CREED. 89 

have been healed and live ! And you might as 
well try to convince the restored blind that the 
sunlight which has again burst on them is a wild 
dream of fancy, or the restored deaf that the world's 
joyous melodies which have again awoke on them 
are the mockeries of their own brain, as convince 
the spiritually enlightened and awakened that He 
who has proved to them light and life, and joy 
and peace — their comfort in prosperity — their re- 
fuge in adversity — is other than the Son of God 
and Saviour of the world! 

Reader, is this your experience? Have you 
tasted and seen that the Lord is gracious ? Have 
you felt the preciousness of His gospel, the adap- 
tation of His work to the necessities of your ruined 
condition? — the power of His grace, the preva- 
lence of His intercession, the fulness and, glory and 
truthfulness of His promises ? Are you exulting 
in Him as the Resurrection and Life, who has raised 
you from the death of sin, and will at last raise 
you from the power of death, and invest you with 
that eternal *life which His love has purchased? 

Precious as is this hope and confidence at all 
times ; specially so is it, mourners in Zion ! in your 



90 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

seasons of sorrow. When human refuges fail, and 
human friendships wither, a$d human props give 
way, how sustaining to have this " anchor of the 
soul sure and steadfast " — union with a living Lord 
on earth, and the joyful hope of endless and unin- 
terrupted union and communion with Him in 
glory ! Are you even now enjoying, through your 
tears, this blessed persuasion, and exulting in this 
blessed creed? Do you know the secret of that 
twofold solace, " the power of His resurrection and 
the fellowship of His sufferings?"— the "fellow- 
ship of His sufferings " telling of His sympathy 
with your sorrows below ; — the " power of His 
resurrection " assuring you of the glorious gift 
of everlasting life in a world where sorrow dare 
not enter. Rest not satisfied with a mere out- 
ward creed and confession that " Jesus is the 
Saviour." Let yours be the nobler formula of an 
appropriating faith — " He is my Saviour ; He 
loved me, and gave Himself for. ME." Let it not 
be with you a salvation possible^ but a salvation 
found ; so that, with a tried apostle, you can 
rise above the surges of deepening tribulation as 
you glory in the conviction, " I know in whom I ' 



' THE MOUENER'S CEEED. 91 

have believed, and am persuaded that He is able 
to keep that which I have committed unto Him." 

Sad ; indeed^ for those who ; when u deep calleth 
unto deep/' have no such " strong consolation " 
to enable them to ride out the storm ; who ; when 
sorrow and bereavement overtake them — the lower- 
ing shadows of the dark and cloudy day — have 
still to grope after an vmknown Christ ; and ? amid 
the hollowness of earthly and counterfeit comforts, 
have to seek ; for the first time, the only true One. 

Oh ! if our hour of trial has not jet come ; let us 
be prepared for it — for come it will. Let us seek 
to have our vessels moored now to the Rock of 
Ages ; that when the tempest arises — when the 
floods beat ; and the winds blow ; and the wrecks 
of earthly joy are seen strewing the waters — we 
may triumphantly utter the challenge-; u Who shall 
separate us from the love of Christ?" 

" Say, ye who tempt 
The sea of life, by summer gales impell'd, 
Have ye this anchor] Sure a time will come 
For storms to try you, and strong blasts to rend 
Your painted sails, and shred your gold like chaff 
O'er the wild wave. And what a wreck is man, 
If sorrow find him unsustain'd by Grod 1 M 



• 

MARTHA can withhold no longer from her sister 
the joyful tidings which she has been the first 
to hear. With fleet foot she hastens back to the 
house with the announcement u The Master is 
come, and calleth for thee." Mary hears, but 
makes no comment. Wrapt in the silence of her 
own meditative grief, u when she heard that, she 
arose quickly and came unto Him." 

" To her all earth could render nothing back 
Like that pale changeless brow. Calmly she stood 
As marble statue. 

In that maiden's breast 
Sorrow and loneliness sank darkly down, 
Though the blanch'd lips breathed out no boisterous plaint 
Of common grief." 

The formal sympathisers who gathered around 
her had observed her departure. They are led to 
form their conjectures as to the cause of this sud- 



THE MASTER. 93 

den break in her trance of anguish. She had up till 
that moment, with the instinctive aversion which 
mourners only know, and which we have formerly- 
alluded to in the case of Martha, been shrinking 
from facing the gladsome light of heaven, caring 
not to look abroad on the blight of an altered 
world. But the few words her sister uttered, and 
which the other auditors manifestly had not com- 
prehended, all at once rouse her from her seat of 
pensive sadness, and her shadow is seen hurrying 
by the darkened lattice. They can form but one 
surmise : that, in accordance with wont, she has 
betaken herself to the burial-ground to feed her 
morbid grief. " She goeth unto the grave to weep 
there." Ah! little did they know how much 
nobler was her motive — how truer and grander 
the solace she sought and found. 

There is little that is really profitable or hal- 
lowed in visiting the grave of loved ones. Though 
fond affection will, from some false feeling of the 
tribute due to the memory of the departed, seek ta 
surmount sadder thoughts, and linger at the spot 
where treasured ashes repose, yet — think and 
act as we may — there is nothing cheering, nothing 



94 MEMORIES OP BETHANY. 

elevating there. The associations of the "burial- 
place are all with the humiliating triumphs of the 
King of Terrors. It is a view of death taken from 
the earthly entrance of the valley, not the heavenly 
view of it as that valley opens on the bright plains 
of immortality. The gay flowers and emerald sod 
which carpet the grave are poor mockeries to 
the bereft spirit, shrouding, as they do, nobler 
withered blossoms which the foot of the destroyer 
has trampled into dust, and which no earthly 
beauty can again clothe, or earthly spring reani- 
mate. They are to be pitied who have no higher 
solace, no better remedy for their grief, than thus 
to water with unavailing tears the trophies of 
death ; or to read the harrowing record which 
love has traced on its slab of cold marble, telling 
of the vanity of human hopes. 

Such, however, was not Mary's errand in leaving 
the chamber of bereavem ent. That drooping flower 
was not opening her leaves, only to be crushed 
afresh with new tear-floods of sorrow. She sought 
One who would disengage her soiled and shattered 
tendrils from the chill comforts of earth, and bathe 
them in the genial influences of Heaven. The 



THE MASTEE. 95 

music of her Master's name alone could put glad- 
ness into h$r heart — tempt her to muffle other 
conflicting feelings and hasten to His feet. " The 
Master is come ! " Nothing could have roused 
her from her profound grief hut this. While her 
poor earthly comforters are imagining her prostrate 
at the sepulchre's mouth, giving vent to the wild 
delirium of her young grief, she is away, not to 
the victim of death, hut to the Lord of Life, either 
to tell to Him the tale of her woe, or else to listen 
from His lips to words of comfort no other com- 
forter had given. Is there not the same music in 
that name — the same solace and joy in that 
presence still? Earthly sympathy is not to be 
despised ; nay J when death has entered a house- 
hold, taken the dearest and the best and laid 
them in the tomb, nothing is more soothing to the 
wounded, crushed, and broken one, than to expe- 
rience the genial sympathy of true Christian 
friendship. Those, it may be, little known before 
(comparative strangers), touched with the story of 
a neighbour's sorrow, come to offer their tribute of 
condolence, and to " weep with those that weep." 
Never is true friendship so tested as then. Hollow 



96 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

attachments, which have nothing but the world or 
a time of prosperity to bind them, discover their 
worthlessness.* " Summer friends " stand aloof — ■ 
they have little patience for the sadness of sorrow's 
countenance and the funereal trappings of the 
death-chamber; while sympathy, based on lofty 
Christian principle, loves to minister as a subordi- 
nate healer of the broken-hearted, and to indulge 
in a hundred nameless ingenious offices of kindness 
and love. 

But u thus far shalt thou go, and no farther." 
The purest and noblest and most disinterested of 
earthly friends can only go a certain way. Their 
minds and sympathies are limited. They cannot 
enter into the deep recesses of the smitten heart — 
the yawning crevices that bereavement has laid 
bare. But Jesus can ! Ah ! there are capacities 
and sensibilities in that Mighty Heart that can 
probe the deepest wound and gauge the pro- 
foundest sorrow. While from the best of earthly 
comforters the mind turns away unsatisfied j while 
the burial-ground and the grave only recall the 
deep humiliations of the body's wreck and ruin— 
with what fond emotion does the spirit, like Mary, 



THE MASTER. 97 

turn to Him who possesses the majesty of Deity 
with all the tenderness of humanity. The Mighty 
Lord, and yet the Elder Brother ! 

The sympathy of man is often selfish, formal, 
constrained, commonplace, coming more from the 
surface than from the depths of the heart. It is 
the finite sympatl^y of a finite creature. The Re- 
deemer's sympathy is that of the perfect Man and 
the infinite God — able to enter into all the pecu- 
liarities of the case — all the tender features and 
shadings of sorrow which are hidden from the 
keenest and kindliest human eye. 

Mary's procedure is a true type and pic- 
ture of what the broken heart of the Chris- 
tian feels. Not undervaluing human sympathy, 
yet, nevertheless, all the crowd of sympathis- 
ing friends — Jewish citizens, Bethany villagers — 
are nothing to her when she hears her Lord has 
come ! 

Happy for us if, while the world, like the con- 
doling crowd of Jews, is forming its own cold specu- 
lations on the amount of our grief and the bitterness 
of our loss ; we are found hastening to cast our- 



98 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

selves at our Saviour's feet; if our afflictions prove 
to us like angel messengers from the inner sanc- 
tuary — calling us from friends, home, comforts, 
"blessings, all we most prize on earth — telling us 
that One is nigh who will more than compensate 
for the loss of all — " The Master is corne^ and calleih 
for thee/' 1 

It is the very end and design our gracious God 
has in all His dealings, to lead us 7 as he led Mary, 
to the feet of Jesus. 

Yes ! thou poor weeping, disconsolate one, " The 
Master calleth for thee" Thee individually, as if 
thou stoodest the alone sufferer in a vast world. 
He wishes to pour His oil and wine into thy 
wounded heart — to give thee some overwhelming 
proof and pledge of the love he tears thee in this 
thy sore trial. He has come to pour drops of 
comfort in the bitter cup — to ease thee of thy 
heavy burden, and to point thee to hopes full of 
immortality. Go and learn what a kind, and 
gentle, and gracious Master He is ! Go forth, 
Mary, and meet thy Lord. u Weeping may 
endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morn- 
ing!" 



THE MASTER. 99 

We may imagine her hastening along the foot- 
road, with the spirit of the Psalmist's words on her 
tongue — " As the hart panteth after the water- 
brooks, so panteth my soul after thee ; God. My 
soul thirsteth for God — fe the living God 1" 



M 



watte €uum. 



With a bounding heart, Mary was in a moment 
at lier Master's feet. She weeps! and is able 
only to articulate, in broken accents, u Lord, if 
thou hadst been here, my brother had not died." 
It is the repetition of Martha's same expression. 
Often at a season of sore bereavement some one 
poignant thought or reflection takes possession of 
the mind, and, for the time, overmasters every 
other. This echo of the other mourner's utterance 
leads us to conclude that 'it had been a familiar 
and oft-quoted phrase during these days of pro- 
tracted agony. This independent quotation, in- 
deed, on the part of each, gives a truthful beauty 
to the whole inspired narrative. 

The 3 ' twin sisters — musing on the terrible past, 
gazing through their tears on the vacant seat at 



X 

SECOND CAUSES. 101 

their home-hearth — had "been every now and then 
breaking the gloomy silence of the deserted chamber 
by exclaiming, u If He had been here, this never 
would have happened! This is the bitterest drop 
in our cup, that all might have been different ! 
These hot tears might never have dimmed our eyes ; 
our loved Lazarus might have been a living and 
loving brother still ! Oh ! that the Lord had de- 
layed for a brief week that untoward journey, or 
anticipated by four days his longed-for return ; or 
would that we had despatched our messenger 
earlier for Him. It is now too late. Though He 
has at last come, His advent can be of little avail. 
The fell destroyer has been at our cottage door 
before Him. He may soothe our grief, but the 
blow cannot be averted. His friend and our 
brother is locked in sleep too deep to be dis- 
turbed. " 

Ah ! is it not the same unkind surmise which ia 
still often heard in the hour of bereavement and in 
the home of death? — a guilty, unholy brooding 
over, second causes. u If such and such had been 
done, my child had still lived. If that mean, or 
that remedy, or that judicious caution had been 



102 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

employed, this terrible overthrow of my earthly 
hopes would never have occurred ; that loved one 
would have been still walking at my side ; that 
chaplet of sorrows would not now have been gird- 
ing my brows ; the Bethany sepulchre would have 
been unopened — l This my brother had not 
died!'" 

Hush ! hush ! these guilty insinuations — that de- 
throning of God from the Providential Sovereignty 
of His own world — that hasty and inconsiderate 
verdict on His divine procedure, 

" If Thou hadst been here ! " Can we ; dare we 
doubt it? Is the departure of the immortal soul 
to the spirit-world so trivial a matter that the 
life-giving God takes no cognisance of it ? No ! 
Mourning one ; in the deep night of thy sorrow, 
thou must rise above " untoward coincidences 
■ — thou must cancel the words a accident \ and 
"fate" from thy vocabulary of trial. God 7 thy 
God ? was there! If there he perplexing accom- 
paniments, be assured they were of His permit- 
ting ; all was planned — wisely, kindly planned. 
Question not the unerring rectitude of His deal- 
ings, Though apparently absent, He was really 



SECOND CAUSES. 103 

present. The apparent veiling of His countenance 
is only what Cowper calls ci the severer aspect of 
His love." Kiss the rod that smites — adore the 
hand that lays low. Pillow thy head on that 
simple, yet grandest source of composure — " The 
Lord reigneih ! " It is not for us to venture to dic- 
tate what the procedure of infinite love and wis- 
dom should be. To our dim and distorted views 
of things, it might have been more for the glory of 
God and the Church's good, if the " beautiful bird 
of light" had still " sat with its folded wings" ere 
it sped to nestle in the eaves of Heaven. But if 
its earthly song has been early hushed j if those 
full of promise have been allowed rather to fall 
asleep in Jesus, " Even so, Father ; for it seems 
good in Thy sight ! " It was from no want of power 
or ability on God's part that they were not recalled 
from the gates of death. " We will be dumb — we 
will open not our mouths, because Thou didst it." 

Afflicted one! if the brother or friend whom 
you now mourn be a brother in glory — if he be 
now among the white-robed multitude — his last 
tear wept — for ever beyond reach of a sinning and 
sorrowing world — can you upbraid your God for 



104 MEMORIES OP BETHANY. 

his early departure ? Would you weep him hack 
if you eould from his early crown ? 

Fond nature, as it stands in trembling agony 
watching the ebbing pulses of life, would willingly 
arrest the pale messenger — stay the chariot — and 
have the wilderness relighted with his -smile. 

But when all is over, and you are able to con- 
template, with calm emotion, the untold bliss into 

which the unfettered spirit has entered, do you not 

-if 

feel as if it were cruel selfishness alone that would 
denude that sainted pilgrim of his glory, and bring 
him once more back to earth's cares and tribu- 
lations ? 

" We sadly watch *d the close of all, 
Life balanced in a breath ; 
We saw upon his features fall 

The awful shade of death. 
All dark and desolate we were ; 
•And murmuring nature cried — 
}. ' Oh ! surely, Lord ! hadst Thou been hew^ 

Our brother had not died !' 

* But when its glance the memory cast 
On all that grace had done ; 
And thought of life's long warfare pass'd, 

And endless victory won. 
Then faith prevailing, wiped the tear, 
And looking upward, cried — 
• Lord ! Thou surely hast been here, 
Our brother has not died ! ' " 



SECOND CAUSES. 105 

We have already had occasion to note the im- 
pressive and significant' silence of the Saviour 
to Mary. We may just again revert to it in 
a sentence here. Martha had, a few moments 
before, given vent to the same impassioned utter- 
ance respecting her departed brother. Jesus had 
replied to her; questioned her as to her faith; 
and opened up to her sublime sources of solace 
and consolation. With Mary it is different. He 
responds to her also — but it is only in silence and 
in tears ! 

Why this distinction ? Does it not unfold to us 
a lovely feature in the dealings of Jesus — how He 
adapts Himself to the peculiarities of individual 
character. With those of a bolder temperament 
He can argue and remonstrate — with those of a 

* 

meek, sensitive, contemplative spirit, He can be 
silent and weep ! 

The stout but manly heart of Peter needed at 
times a bold and cutting rebuke ; a similar reproof 
would have crushed to the dust the tender soul 
of John. The character of the one is painted in 
his walking on the stormy water to meet his Lord ; 
of the other, in his reclining on the bosom of the 



106 MEMORIES OP BETHANY. 

same Divine Master, drinking sacred draughts at 
the Fountain-head of love ! 

So it was with Martha and Mary, " the Peter 
and John of Bethany ; " and so it is with His 
people still. 

How beautifully and considerately Jesus studies 
their case — adapting His dealings to what He 
sees and knows they can bear — fitting the yoke to 
the neck, and the neck to the yoke. To some He 
is " the Lion of the tribe of Judah, uttering His 
thunders" — pleading with Martha-spirits u by ter- 
rible things in righteousness ; " — to others (the 
shrinking, sensitive Marys) whispering only ac- 
cents of gentleness — giving expression to no need- 
less word that would aggravate or embitter their 
sorrows. 

Ah, believer ! how tenderly considerate is your 
dear Lord ! Well may you make it your prayer, 
u Let me fall into the hands of God, for great are 
His mercies ! " He may at times, like Joseph to 
His brethren, appear to " speak roughly," but it is 
dissembled kindness. When a father inflicts, on 
his wayward child the severest and harshest dis- 
cipline, none but he can tell the bitter heart-pangs 



SECOND CAUSES. IC7 

of yearning love that accompany every stroke of the 
rod. So it is with your Father in Heaven; with 
this difference, that the earthly parent may act un- 
wisely, arbitrarily, indiscreetly— he may misjudge 
the necessities of the case — he may do violence and 
wrong to the natural disposition of his offspring. 
Not so with an all- wise Heaverjy Parent. He will 
inflict no redundant or unneeded chastisement. Man 
may err, has erred, and is ever erring — Ibut **as 
for God ; His way is perfect ! n 



■v 




XIL 



* W&n$a% Bttbwnr. 



The silent procession is moving on. We may 
suppose they have reached the gates of the burial- 
ground. But a new scene and incident here arrest 
our thoughts ! 

It is not the humiliating memorials of mortality 
that lie scattered around ; — the caves and grottoes 
and grassy heaps sacred to many a Bethany vil- 
lager. It is not even the newly sealed stone which 
marks the spot where Lazarus " sleeps." Let us 
turn aside for a little, and see this great sight. 
It is the Creator of all worlds in tears ! — the 
God-man Mediator dissolved in tenderest grief! 
Of all the memories of Bethany, this surely is the 
most hallowed and the most wondrous. These 
tears form the most touching episode in sacred 
story; and if we are in sorrow, it may either djy 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 109 

our own tears, or give them the warrant to flow 
when we are told — Jesus wept ! 

Whence those tears? This is what we shall 
now inquire. There is often a false interpretation 
put upon this brief and touching verse, as if it 
denoted the expression of the Saviour's sorrow for 
the loss of a loved friend. This, it is plain, it 
could not be. However mingled may have been 
the hopes and fears of the weeping mourners around 
him, He at least knew that in a few brief moments 
Lazarus was to be restored. He could not surely 
weep so bitterly, possessing, as He then did, the 
confident assurance that death was about to give 
back its captive, and light up every tear-dimmed 
eye with an ecstasy of joy. Whence, then, we 
again ask, this strange and mysterious grief? 
Come and let us surround the grave of Bethany, 
and as we behold the chief mourner at that grave, 
let us inquire why it was that " Jesus wept I " 

(1.) Jesus wept out of Sympathy for the Bereaved. 

The hearts around Him were breaking with 
anguish. All unconscious of how soon and how 
wondrously their sorrow was to be turned into 



110 MEMORIES OF BETH ANT, 

joy, the appalling thought was alone present to 
them in all its fearfulness — u Lazarus is dead ! " 
When He, the God-man Mediator, with the re- 
fined sensibilities of His tender heart, beheld the 
poignancy of that grief, the pent-up torrent of His 
own human sympathies could be restrained no 
longer. His tears flowed too. 

But it would be a contracted view of the tears 
of Jesus to think that two solitary mourners in 
a Jewish graveyard engrossed and monopolised 
that sympathy. It had a far wider sweep. 

There were hearts, yes — myriads of desolate 
sufferers in ages then unborn, who He knew would 
be brought to stand as He was then doing by the 
grave of loved relatives — mourners who would have 
no visible comforter or restorer to rush to, as had 
Martha and Mary, to dry their tears, and give 
them back their dead ; and when He thought of 
this, u Jesus wept ! " 

What an interest it gives to that scene of weep- 
ing, to think that at that eventful moment, the 
Saviour had before Him the bereaved of all time — - 
that His eye was roaming at that moment through 
deserted chambers, and vacant seats, and opened 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. Ill 

graves, down to the end of the world. The aged 
Jacobs and Rachels weeping for their children — 
the Ezekiels -mourning in the dust and ashes of 
disconsolate widowhood, " the desire of their eyes 
taken away by a stroke" — the unsolaced Marys and 
Marthas brooding over a dark future, with the 
prop and support of existence swept down, the 
central sun and light of their being eclipsed in 
mysterious darkness ! Think, (as you are now 
perusing these pages,) throughout the wide world, 
how many breaking hearts there are — how loud 
the wail of suffering humanity, could we but hear 
it ! — those written childless and fatherless, and 
friendless and homeless ! — Bethany-processions 
pacing with slow and measured step to deposit 
their earthly all in the cold custody of the tomb ! 
Think of the Marys and Marthas who are now 
iC going to some grave to weep there," perhaps 
with no Saviour's smile to gladden them — or the 
desolate chambers that are now resounding to the 
plaintive dirge, u Absalom, Absalom, would 
God I had died for thee ; Absalom, my son ! 
my son ! " Think of all these scenes at that 
moment vividly suggested and pictured to the 



112 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY. 

Redeemer's eye — the long and loud miserere, 
echoing dismally from the remotest bounds of 
time, and there " entering into the ear of the God 
of Sabaoth," and can you wonder that — Jesus 
wept! 

Blessed and amazing picture of the Lord of 
glory ! It combines the delineation alike of the 
tenderness of His humanity, and the majesty of 
His Godhead. His Humanity ! It is revealed 
in those tear drops, falling from a human eye on 
a human grave. His Godhead/ It is mani- 
fested in His ability to take in with a giant 
grasp all the prospective sufferings of His suffer- 
ing people. 

Weeping believer ! thine anguished heart was 
included in those Bethany tears ! Be assured thy 
grief was visibly portrayed at that moment to that 
omniscient Saviour. He had all thy sorrows 
before Him — thy anxious moments during thy 
friend's tedious sickness — the trembling suspense 
—the nights of weary watching — the agonising 
revelation of u no hope"— the closing scene! 
Bethany's graveyard became to Him a picture- 
gallery of the world's aching hearts; and thine, yes ! 



THE WEEPINGS SAVIOUR. 113 

thine was there! and as He beheld it ; "Jesus 
wept!" 

4t Jesus wept ! These tears are over, 
But His heart is still the same ; 
Kinsman, Friend, and Elder Brother, 
Is His everlasting name. 

Saviour, who can love like Thee, 
Gracious One of Bethany ! 

" "When the pangs of trial seize us, 
When the waves of sorrow roll, 
I will lay my head on Jesus, 
Pillow of the troubled soul. 

Surely none can feel like Thee, 
Weeping One of Bethany ! 

u Jesus wept ! And still in glory, . 
He can mark each mourner's tearj 
Loving to retrace the story 
Of the hearts he solaced here. 

Lord ! when I am call'd to die* 
Let me think of Bethany ! 

w Jesus wept ! That tear oi sorrow 
Is a legacy of love ; 
Yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, 
He the same cloth ever prove. 

Thou art all in all to me, 
Living One of Bethany !" 

(2.) Jesus wept when He "thought of the 

triumphs of Death ! 

He was treading a burial ground— mouldering 



114 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

heaps were around Him — silent sepulchral caves, 
giving forth no echo of life ! 

It is a solemn and impressive thing, even for us y 
to tread the graveyard ; more especially if there 
are there nameless treasures of buried affection. 
The thought that those whose smile gladdened to 
us every step in the wilderness, who formed our 
solace in sorrow, and our joy in adversity — whose 
words, and society, and converse were intertwined 
with our very being — it is solemn and saddening, 
as w^ tread that land of oblivion, to find these 
words and looks and tears unanswered — a gloomy 
silence hovering over the spot where the wrecks of 
worth and loveliness are laid ! He would have a 
bold, a stern heart indeed who could pace un- 
moved over such hallowed ground, and forbid a 
tear to flow over the gushing memories of the 
past! 

What, then, must it have been at that moment 
in Bethany with Jesus, when he saw one of those 
purchased by his own blood (dearest to him) 
chased by the unsparing destroyer to that gloomy 
prison-house ? 

If we have supposed that the tears of Martha 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 115 

and Mary were suggestive of manifold other broken 
and sorrowing hearts in other ages, we may well 
believe that graveyard was suggestive of triumphs 
still ia reserve for the tomb, numberless trophies 
which in every age were to be reaped in by the 
King of Terrors until the reaper's arm was para- 
lyzed, and death swallowed up in victory. The 
few silent sepulchres around must have signifi- 
cantly called to the mind of the Divine spectator 
how sin had blasted and scathed His noblest work- 
manship ; converting the fairest province of His 
creation into one vast Necropolis , — one dismal 
" city of the dead ! " The body of man, u so fear- 
fully and wonderfully made," and on which he 
had originally placed His own impress of " very 
good," ruined, and resolved into a mass of humi- 
liating dust ! If the Architect mourns over the 
destruction of some favourite edifice which the 
storm has swept down, or the fire has wrapt in 
conflagration and reduced to ashes — if the Sculp- 
tor mourns to see his breathing marble with one 
rude stroke hurled to the ground, and its fragments 
scattered, at his feet — what must have been the 
sensations of the mighty Architect of the human 



116 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

frame, at whose completion the morning stars an** 
the sons of God chanted a loud anthem — what 
must have been His sensations as He thought of 
them, now a devastated wreck, mouldering in dis- 
solution and decay, the King of Terrors sitting in 
regal state, holding his high holiday over a vassal 
world ! 

In Bethany He beheld only a few of these 
broken and prostrate columns, but they were 
powerfully suggestive of millions on millions 
which were yet in coming ages to undergo the 
same doom of mortality. 

If even our less sensitive hearts may be wrung 
with emotion at the tidings of some mournful 
catastrophe that occupies, after all, but some pass- 
ing hour in the world's history, but which has 
carried death and lamentation into many house- 
holds — the sudden pestilence that has swept down 
its thousands — the gallant vessel that was a mo- 
ment before spreading proudly its white wings to 
the gale, the joyous hearts on board dreaming of 
hearth and home, and the u many ports that would 
exult in the gleam of her mast " — the next! 
hurrying down to the depths of an ocean grave. 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 117 

with no survivor to tell the tale ! — or the terrible 
records of Wkr — the ranks of hold and brave laid 
low in the carnage of battle — youth and strength 
and beauty and rank and friendship blent in one 
red burial ! — if these and such like mournful tales 
of death ; and the power of death, affect at the 
moment even the most callous amongst us, causing 
the lip to grow pale, and demanding the tribute 
of more than a tear, oh ! what must it have been 
to the omniscient eye and exquisitely sensitive 
spirit of Jesus, as, taking in all time at a glance, 
He beheld the Pale Horse with its ghastly rider 
trampling under foot the vast human family ; 
converting the globe in which they dwelt into a 
mournful valley of vision, filled with the wrecks 
and skeletons of breathing men and animated 
frames ! 

The triumphs of death are, in ordinary cir- 
cumstances, to us scarcely perceptible. He moves 
with noiseless tread. The footprint is made on 
the sands of time; but like the tides of the 
ocean, the world's oblivion-power washes it away. 
The name of yonder churchyard is " the land 
of forgetfulness ! " Not so with the Lord of 



118 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Life, the great Antagonist of this usurper ! The 
future, a ghastly future, rose in ap]Silling vivid- 
ness before Him. — Death (vulture-like) flapping his 
wings over the multitudes he claimed as his own, 
— vessels freighted with immortality lying wrecked 
and stranded on the shores of Time ! 

Yes ! we can only understand the full import of 
these tears of Jesus, as we imagine to ourselves His 
Godlike eye penetrating at that moment every 
churchyard and every grave: the mausoleums of 
the great — the grassy sods of the poor ; the marble 
cenotaph of the noble and illustrious slumber- 
ing under fretted aisle and cathedral canopy— the 
myriads whose requiem* is chanted by the bleak 
winds of the desert or the chimes of the ocean! 
The child carried awayjfi the twinkling of an eye — 
the blossom just opening, and then frost-blighted; 
the aged sire, cut down like a shock of corn in its 
season, falling withered and seared like the leaves 
of autumn ; the young exulting in the prime of 
manhood ; the pious and benevolent, the great and 
good, succumbing indiscriminately to the same 
inexorable decree ; the erring and thoughtless, 
reckless of all warning, hurried away in the midst 






THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 119 

of scorned mercy — Oil ! as He beheld this ghastly 
funeral procession moving "before Him, the whole 
world going to the same long home, and He Him- 
self alone left the survivor, can we wonder that 
Jesus wept? 

(3.) Once more, Jesus WEPT token He thought oj 
the impenitence and obduracy of the human heart. 

This may not be at first sight patent as a cause 
of the tears of Jesus, but we may well believe it 
entered largely as an element into this strange 
flood of sorrow. 

He was about to perform a great (His greatest) 
miracle ; but while he knew that, in consequence 
of this manifestation of His mighty power, many 
of those w T ho now stood around Lazarus' tomb 
would believe, he knew also that others would 
only " despise, and wonder, and perish ; " that 
while some, as we shall afterwards find, acknow- 
ledged Him as the Messiah, others went straight- 
way into Jerusalem to concert with the Pharisees 
in plotting His murder. When He observed the 
i ni penitence of these obdurate hearts at His side, 
He could not subdue His tenderest emotion. We 



/ 



120 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

read that, "when He saw tlie sisters weeping, and 
the Jews that were with them weeping , Jesus wept. 
These Jews could weep for a fellow-mortal, but 
they could not weep for themselves, and therefore 
for tliem } Jesus wept I 

One soul was precious to Him. He who alone 
can estimate alike the worth and the loss of the soul, 
might have wept, even had there been but one 
then present found to resist His claims and forfeit 
His salvation. But these tears extended far be- 
yond that lonely spot in a Jewish village, and the 
few impenitent hearts that were then flocking 
around. These obdurate Jews were types of the 
world's impenitency. There was at that moment 
summoned before Him a mournful picture of the 
hardened hearts in every age — those who would 
read His gospel, and hear of His miracles, and 
listen to the story of His love all unmoved — who 
would die as they had lived, uncheered by His 
grace and unmeet for His presence. 

Ah ! surely no cause could more tenderly elicit 
a Redeemer's tears than this — the thought of His 
Redemption scorned, His blood trampled on ; Hia 
work set at nought. 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 121 

If we have thought of Him shedding tears over 
the ruin of the body, what must have been the 
d^pth and intensity of those tears over the sadder, 
more fearful ruin of the soul ? Immortal powers, 
that ought to have been ennobled and consecrated 
to His service, alienated, degraded, destroyed ! — 
immortal beings spurning from them the day of 
grace and the hopes of heaven! Bitter as may 
have been the wail of mourning and sorrowing 
hearts that may then have reached His ear from 
future ages, more agonising and dismal far must 
have been the wailing cry which, beyond the 
limits of time, came floating up from a dark and 
dreary eternity ; those who might have believed 
and lived, but who blasphemed or trifled, neglected 
and procrastinated, and finally perished ! 

If we think of it, it is not the loss, of health, or 
the loss of wealth, or the loss of friends, which 
forms the heaviest of trials, the deepest ground of 
soul sadness. We put on the sable attire as em- 
blems of mourning ; but if we saw it as a weeping 
Jesus sees it, there is more real cause for sackcloth 
and ashes in the heart at enmity with God, and 
despising His salvation, trampling under foot His 






122 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

Son, and enacting over again the sad tragedy of 
Calvary. 

Reader ! are yon at this moment guilty of living, 
on in a state of presumptuous impenitence — salva- 
tion unsought— Jesus a stranger — His name un- 
honoured — His Bible unread — His promises un- 
appropriated—His wrath undreaded — defeating all 
His marvellous appliances of love, and remon- 
strance, and forbearance- — meeting a prodigal ex- 
penditure of patience and long-suffering with cold 
and chilling indifference and neglect — casting away 
from you the hoarded riches of eternity which He 
has been holding out for your acceptance ? In 
that sacred Bethany ground, as ye mark these fall- 
ing tear-drops which dim His eye, there may have 
been a tear for you ! Eighteen hundred years have 
since elapsed, but He to whom u a thousand years 
are as one day," marked even then your present un- 
grateful apostacy or guilty alienation — there was a 
tear then which stole down that cheek on aceount 
of unrequited love ? 

Is that tear to flow in vain ? Are you to mock 
His tender sympathy still with cold formalism, 
or persisted-in impenitency? Are you to think 



THE WEEPING SAVIOUR. 123 

of Bethany and its tear-drops and still go on in 
sin? 

Ah, never was sermon preached to an erring or 
impenitent sinner half so eloquent as this. Paul 
was not given to weeping, and it makes his fervid 
love of souls all the more striking when we find 
him confessing that he had wept like a child over 
those who were " enemies to the cross of Christ." 
We have often felt Paul's "burning tears over har- 
dened sinners to Tbe touching and impressive. But 
what are they, after all, in comparison with those 
of Paul's Lord ? 

He, the Great Sun of the World — the Sun of 
Righteousness, was to set in a few brief days 
behind the walls of ungrateful Jerusalem in dark- 
ness and blood — His last rays seem now linger- 
ing over the crest of Olivet — His tears seem to 
tell that He has clung till He can cling no more 
to the fond hope that an impenitent nation and 
guilty city w T ill yet turn at His reproof, believe 
and live. 

And still does He linger among us. Though 
the night cometh, the beams of mercy are still 
tardily lingering, as if loth to leave the backsliding 



124 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

to their "wanderings, or the impenitent to their own 
midnight of despair. 

O Reader ! leave not this subject— -leave not the 
graveyard of Bethany till you think of Jesus as 
then weeping for tJiee. Yes ! for thee — -thy pitiable 
condition — thy perverse ingratitude — thy slighting 
of His warnings — thy grieving of His spirit — thy 
unkindness to Sim — thine obstinate disregard of 
thine own everlasting interests. Leo it be the most 
wondrous and heart-searching of all the memories 
of Bethany, that for thy soul — that traitor, truant, 
worthless soul — which like a stray planet He might 
have suffered to drift away from Himself into the 
blackness of eternal darkness — helpless, hopeless, 
ruined, lost! — Yes-! that for thee, Jesus wept I 

te And doth the Saviour weep 

Over His people's sin, 
Because we will not let Him keep 

The souls He died to win ? 
Ye hearts that love the Lord, 

If at this sight ye burn, 
See that in thought, in deed, in word, 

Ye hate what made Him mourn." 




XIII. 



t $mbz Biont. 



They have now reached the grave. It was a 

rocky sepulchre. A flat stone (possibly with some 
Hebrew inscription) lay upon the mouth of it. 

In wondering amazement the sorrowing group 
follow the footsteps of the Saviour. " Behold how 
He loved him/' whisper the Jews to one another 
as they witness His fast falling tears. Can His 
repairing thus to the tomb be anything more than 
to pay a mournful tribute to an honoured friend- 
ship, and behold the silent home of the loved dead? 
Nay ; He is about, as the Lord of Life, to wrench 
away the swaddling-bands of corruption, to vindi- 
cate His name and prerogative as the " Abolisher of 
death" — to have the first-fruits of that vast triumph 
which, ages before the birth of time, He had an- 
ticipated with longing earnestness — " I will ran- 



126 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Bom them from tlie power of the grave, I will 
redeem them from death. O death, I will be thy 
plagues ; grave, I will be thy destruction." 

Does He proceed forthwith to speak the word, 
and .to accomplish the giant deed? He "breaks 
silence. But we listen, in the first instance, not 
to the omnipotent summons, but to an address to 
the bystanders — -" Jesus said, Take ye away the 
stone!" * 

"What need of this parenthesis in His mighty 
work ? Why this summoning in any feeble human 
agency when His own independent fiat could have 
effected the whole? Would it not have been a 
more startling manifestation of Omnipotence, by a 
mandate similar to that which chained the tempests 
of Tiberias, or the demoniac of Gadara, to have 
hurled the incumbent stone into fragments ? Might 
not He who has " the keys of the grave and of 
death" have Himself unlocked the portals pre- 
paratory to the vaster prodigy that was to fol- 
low? 

Nay, there was a mighty lesson to be read in 
thus delegating human hands to remove the in-* 

* John id. 39. 



THE GKAVE STONE. 127 

tervening "barrier. The Church of the living 
God may, in every age, gather from it instruc- 
tion ! 

What, then, does the Saviour here figuratively, 
but significantly, teach His people ? Is it not the 
important truth that, though .dependent on Him for 
all they are, and all they have, they are not 
thereby released and exempted from the use of 
means ? He alone can bring back Lazarus from 
his death-sleep. Martha and Mary may weep an 
ocean of tears, but they cannot weep him back. 
They may linger for days and nights in that lonely 
graveyard, making it resound with their bitter 
dirges, but their impassioned entreaties will be 
mocked with impressive silence. Too well do 
they know that spirit is fled beyond their recall — 
the spark of life extinguished beyond any earthly 
rekindling ! 

But though the word of Omnipotence can alone 
brino* back the dead, human hands and human 
efforts can roll away the interjacent stone, and pre- 
pare for the performance of the miracle ; and after 
the miracle is performed, human hands may again 
be called in to tear off the cerements of the tomb, 



128 MEMORIES OP BETHANT. 

to ungird the bandages from the restored captive, 
to u loose him and let him go ! " 

This simple incident in the Bethany narrative 
admits of manifold practical applications. Let us 
look to it with reference to the mightier moral 
miracle of the Resurrection of the sonl " dead in 
trespasses and sins." Jesus, and Jesus alone, can 
awake that soul from the deep slumber of its spiri- 
tual death, and invest it with the glories of a new 
resurrection-life. In vain can it awake of itself ; 
no human skill can put animation into the moral 
skeleton, No power of human eloquence, no " ex- 
cellency of man's wisdom," can open these ray less 
eyes, and pour life, and light, and hope into the 
dull caverns of the spiritual sepulchre. " Prophesy 
to the dry bones ! " — We may prophesy for ever — 
we may wake the valley of vision by ceaseless in- 
vocations, but the dead will hear not. No bone 
of the spiritual skeleton will stir, for it is u not by 
might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the 
Lord of Hosts." 

But though it be a Divine work from first to last 
which effects the spiritual regeneration of man, are 
we from this presumptuously to disregard the use 



THE GHAVE STONE. 129 

of means ? Are prayer, and preaching, and human 
effort, and strenuous earnestness in the work of our 
high calling, are these all to he superseded, and 
pronounced unavailing and unnecessary ? 

Nay, though man cannot wake to life his dor- 
mant spiritual energies — though these lie slumber- 
ing in the deep sleep of the sheeted dead, and 
nothing but Lazarus' Lord can break the moral 
trance — yet lie can use the appointed means. He 
dare not be guilty of the monstrous inconsistency 
and crime of willingly allowing impediments to 
stand in the way of his spiritual revival which his 
own efforts may remove ! He cannot expect his 
Lord to sound over his soul the gladdening ac- 
cents of peace, and reconciliation, and joy, if some 
known sin be still lying, like the superincumbent 
grave-stone, which it is in his power to roll away, 
and at his peril if he suffer to remain ! 

Christ is alone the " abolisher of death," and 
the "giver of life;" but notwithstanding this, 
" Roll ye away the stone ! " — neglect not the means 
He has appointed and prescribed. If ye neglect 
prayer, and despise ordinances, and trifle with 
temptation, or venture on forbidden ground, ye are 



130 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

only making the intervening obstacle firmer and 
faster, and wilfully denuding yourselves of the gift 
of life. Naaman must plunge seven times in 
Jordan, else lie cannot be made clean. To cleanse 
himself of his leprosy he cannot, but to wash in 
Jordan he can. The Israelite must gaze on the 
brazen serpent ; he cannot of himself heal one 
fevered wound, but to gaze on the appointed sym- 
bol of cure he can. In vain can the engines of 
war effect a breach on the walls of Jericho ; but the 
hosts of Joshua can sound the appointed trumpet, 
and raise the prescribed shout, and the battlements 
in a moment are in the dust. Martha and Mary 
in vain can make their voices be heard in the 
u dull, cold ear of death," but at their Lord's bid- 
ding they can hurl back the outer portals where 
their dead is laid. They cannot unbind one fetter, 
but they can open with human hand the prison- 
door to admit the Divine Liberator. 

Let it not be supposed that in this we detract in 
any wise from the omnipotence of the Saviour's 
grace. God forbid ! All is of grace, from first to 
last — free, sovereign grace. Man has no more merit 
in salvation than the beggar has merit in reaching 



THE GRAVE STONE, 131 

forth his hand for alms, or in stooping down to 
drink of the wayside fountain. But neither must 
we ignore the great truth which God strives 
throughout His Word to impress upon us, that 
He works by means, and that for the neglect of 
these means we are ourselves responsible. Paul 
had the assurance given him by an angel from 
heaven, when tossed in the storm in Adria, that 
not one life in his vessel was to be lost ; that 
though the ship was to be WTecked, all her crew 
were to come safe to land. But was there on this 
account any effort on his part relaxed to secure 
their safety ? No ! he toiled and laboured at the 
pumps and rigging and anchors as unremittingly 
as before : and when some of the sailors made the 
cowardly attempt, by lowering a small boat, to 
effect their own escape, the voice of the apostle 
was heard proclaiming, amid the storm, that unless 
they abode in the ship none could be saved ! 

The true philosophy of the "Gospel system is 
this, to feel as if much depended on ourselves ; but 
at the same time entertaining the loftier conviction 
that all depends upon God. Jesus, when He in- 
vites to the strait gate, does r.ot inculcate remain- 



132 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

ing outside, in a state of passive and listless inac- 
tion, until the portals be seen to move by the Divine 
hand. His exhortation and command rather 
is, "Strive" — "knock" — agonise to "enter in!" 
We are not to ascend to heaven, seated, like Elijah, 
in a chariot of fire, without toil or effort, but rather 
to u fight the good fight of faith." The saying of the 
great Apostle is a vivid portraiture of what the 
Christian's feelings ought to be regarding personal 
holiness — " I laboured, . . . yet not I, but the grace 
of God which was with me." 

As the Lord of Bethany gives the summons, 
u Roll ye away the stone," His words seem para- 
phrased in this other Scripture, " Work out your 
own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is 
God that worketh in you both to will and to do 
of his good pleasure." You may feel assured 
that He will not impose upon you one needless 
burden ; He will not exact more than He knows 
your strength will bear ; He will ask no Peter to 
come to Him on the water, unless He impart at the 
same time strength and support on the unstable 
wave ; He will not demand of you the endurance 
of providences, and trials, and temptations you ard 



THE GEAVE STONE. 133 

unable to cope with ; He will not ask you to draw 
water if the well is too deep, or withdraw the stone 
if too heavy. But neither, at the same time, will 
He admit as an impossibility that which, as a free 
and responsible agent, it is in your power to ayert. 
He will not regard as your misfortune what is your 
crime. "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the 
Lord will not hear me." 

Oh ! let life be, more than it ever has been, one 
constant effort to roll away the stone from the 
moral sepulchre — carefully to remove every barrier 
between our souls and Jesus — looking forward to 
that glorious day when the voice of the Eestorer 
shall be heard uttering the omnipotent " Come 
forth/" and to His angel assessors the mandate 
shall be given regarding the thronging myriads of 
risen dead, " Loose them and let them go / " 



XIV. 

Man — short-sighted man — often raises impossibili- 
ties when God does not. It is hard for rebellious 
unbelief to lie submissive and still. In moments 
when the spirit might well be overawed into silence, 
it gives utterance to its querulous questionings 
and surmisings rather than remain obedient at the 
feet of Christ, reposing on the sublime aphorism, 
"All things are possible to him that believeth." 
In the mind of Martha, where faith had been so 
recently triumphant, doubt and unbelief have be- 
gun again to insinuate themselves. This u Peter 
of her sex" had ventured out boldly on the water 
to meet her Lord. She had owned Him as the 
giver of life, and triumphed in Him as her Saviour! 
But now she is beginning to sink. A natural diffi- 
culty presents itself to her mind about the removal 



UNBELIEF. 135 

of the incumbent grave-stone. She avers how 
needless its displacement would be, as by this time 
corruption must have begun its fatal work. Four 
brief days only had elapsed since the eye of 
Lazarus had beamed with fraternal affection. Now 
these lips must be " saying to corruption, Thou art 
my father ; to the worm, Thou art my mother and 
my sister." Death, she felt, must now be stamping 
his impressive mockery on that cherished earthly 
friendship, and, attired in his most terrible insignia, 
putting the last fatal extinguisher on the gHm- 
merings of her faith and hope. "What need is 
there, Lord," she seems to say, " for this redundant 
labour ? My brother is far beyond the reach even 
of a voice like Thine. Why excite vain expecta- 
tions in my breast which never can be realised ? 
That grave has closed upon him for the l for ever ' 
of time. Nothing now can revoke the sentence, or 
reanimate the silent dust, save the trump of God 
on the final dav." * 

Thus blindly did Martha reason. She can see no 
other object her Eedeemer can have for the removal 
of the stone, save to gaze once more on a form and 

* John xi. 39. 



136 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

countenance He loved. Both for His sake, and 
the strangers assembled, she recoils from the 
thought of disclosing so humiliating a sight. 

Alas! how little are fitful frames and feelings 
to Tbe trusted. Only a few brief moments before, 
she had made a noble protestation of her faith in 
the presence of her Lord. His own majestic ut- 
terances had soothed her griefs, dried her tears, 
and elicited the confession that He was truly the 
Son of God. But the sight of the tomb and its 
mournful accompaniments obliterate for a moment 
the recollection of better thoughts and a nobler 
avowal. She forgets that u things which are im- 
possible with men are possible with God." She 
is guilty of " limiting the Holy One of Israel." 

How often is it so with us ! How easy is it for 
us, like Martha, to be bold in our creed when 
there is nothing to cross our wishes, or dim and 
darken our faith. But when the hour of trial 
comes, how often does sense threaten to displace 
and supplant the nobler antagonist principle! 
How often do we lose sight of the Saviour at the 
very moment when we most need to have Him 
continually in view ! How often are our convic- 



UNBELIEF. 137 

tions of the efficacy of prayer most dulled and 
deadened just when the dark waves are cresting 
over our heads, and voices of unbelief are uttering 
the upbraiding in our ears, " Where is now thy 
God ? " But will Jesus leave His people to their 
own guilty unbelieving doubts? Will Martha ; 
by her unworthy insinuations, put an arrest on 
her Lord's arm ; or will He, in righteous retribu- 
tion for her faithlessness, leave the stone sealed ; 
and the dead unraised ? 

Nay ! He loves His people too well to let their 
stupid unbelief and hardness of heart interfere 
with His own gracious purposes ! How tenderly 
He rebukes the spirit of this doubter. u Why," 
as if He said, u Why distrust me ? Why stultify 
thyself with these unbelieving surmises. Hast 
thou already forgotten my own gracious assur- 
ances, and thine own unqualified acceptance of 
them. My hand is never shortened that it cannot 
save ; my ear is never heavy that it cannot hear. 
I can call the things which are not, and make 
them as though they were. Said I not unto thee ; 
in that earnest conversation which I had a little 
ago outside the village, in which Gospel faith was 



138 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

the great theme, if thou wouldst "believe, thou 
shouldst see the glory of God ? " 

This Bethany utterance has still a voice,- — a 
voice of rebuke and of comfort in our hours of 
trial. When, like aged Jacob, we are ready to 
say, u All these things are against me ; ' when 
we are about to lose the footsteps of a God of love, 
or have perhaps lost them, there is a voice ready 
to hush into silence every unbelieving doubt and 
Surmise. " Although thou sayest thou canst not 
see Him, yet judgment is before Him, therefore 
trust thou in Him." God often thus hides Him- 
self from His people in order to try their faith, 
and elicit their confidence. He puts us in per- 
plexing paths — " allures" and " brings into the wil- 
derness," only, however, that we may see more of 
Himself, and that He may " speak comfortably 
unto us." He lets our need attain its extremity, 
that His intervention may appear the more signal. 
He suffers apparently even His own promises to 
fail, that He may test the faith of His waiting 
people ; — tutor them to u hope against hope," and 
to find, in unanswered prayers and baffled expecta- 
tions, only a fresh reason for clinging to His all- 
powerful arm ; and frequenting His mercy-seat. 



UNBELIEF. 139 

He dashes first to the ground our human confi- 
dences and refuges, shewing how utterly " vain is 
the help of man;" so that faith, with her own 
folded, dove-like wings, may repose in quiet confi- 
dence in His faithfulness, saying, " In the Lord 
put I my trust : why say ye to my soul, Flee as a 
bird to your mountain ? " 

Reader ! It would be well for you to hear this 
gentle chiding of Christ, too, in the moment of your 
spiritual depression ; — when complaining of your 
corruptions, the weakness of your graces, your low 
attainments in holiness, the strength of your temp- 
tations, and your inability to resist sin. " Said 1 
not unto thee," interposes this voice of mingled 
reproof and love, " My grace is sufficient for thee ?" 
u The bruised reed I will not break, the smoking 
flax I will not quench." "Look unto Me, and be 
ye saved,. all the ends of the earth." We are too 
apt to look to ourselves, to turn our contemplation 
inwards, instead of keeping the eye of faith cen- 
tered undeviatingly on a faithful covenant-keeping 
God, laying our finger on every promise of His 
Word, and making the challenge regarding each, 
ic Hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath 
he spoken, and shall he not bring it to pass ? 



*)» 



140 MEMOB1ES OF BETHANY. 

Yes; there may be much to try and perplex. 
Sense and sight may stagger, and stumble, and 
fall ; we may be able to see no break in the clouds ; 
u deep may be calling to deep/' and wave respond- 
ing to wave, "yet the Lord will command his 
loving-kindness in the daytime, and in the night 
his song shall be with me." If we only " believe " 
in spite of unbelief j hoping on, and praying on, and 
trusting on ; like the great Father of the faithful, 
in the midst of adverse providences, " strong in 
faith, giving glory to God," He will yet cause the 
day-spring from on high to visit us. Even in this 
world perplexing paths may be made plain, and 
slippery places smooth, and judgments " bright as 
the noonday; " but if not here, there is at least a 
glorious day of disclosures at hand, when the reign 
of unbelieving doubt shall terminate for ever, when 
the archives of a chequered past will be ransacked 
of their every mystery ; — all events mirrored and 
made plain in the light of eternity ; and this saying 
of the weeping Saviour of Bethany obtain its true 
and everlasting fulfilment, " Said I not unto 

THEE, IF THOU WOULDST BELIEVE ; THOU SHOULDST 
SEE THE GLORY OF GOD?" 




t jaifrfrtt llleafrer. 



The stone is rolled away, but there is a solemn 
pause just when the miracle is about to be per- 
formed.. 

Jesus prays ! The God-Man Mediator — the 
Lord of Life — the Abolisher of Death — the Being of 
all Beings — who had the boundless treasures of 
eternity in His grasp — pauses by the grave of the 
dead, and lifts up His eyes to heaven in supplica- 
tion ! How often in the same incidents, during our 
Lord's incarnation, do we find His manhood and 
His Godhead standing together in stupendous con- 
trast. At His birth, the mystic star and the lowly 
manger were together ; at His death, the ignomi- 
nious cross and the eclipsed sun were together. 
Here He weeps and prays at the very moment 
when He is baring the arm of Omnipotence. Tlw 



142 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

"mighty God" appears in conjunction with "the 
man Christ Jesus." " His name is Immanuel, 
God with us." 

The body of Lazarus was now probably, by the 
rolling away of the stone, exposed to view. It 
was a humiliating sight. Earth — the grave — 
could afford no solace to the spectators. The Re- 
deemer, \)j a significant act, shews them where 
alone, at such an hour, comfort can be found. He 
points the mourning spirit to its only true source 
of consolation and peace in God Himself, teaching 
it to rise above the mortal to the immortal — the 
corruptible to the incorruptible — from earth to 
heaven. 

Ah ! there is nothing but humiliation and sad- 
ness in every view of the grave and corruption. 
"Why dwell on the shattered casket, and not rather 
on the jewel which is sparkling brighter than ever 
in a better world? Why persist in gazing on the 
trophies of the last enemy, when we can joyfully 
realise the emancipated soul exulting in the pleni- 
tude of purchased bliss? Why fall with broken 
wing and w^ailing cry to the dust, when on eagle- 
pinion we can soar to the celestial gate, and learn 



THE DIVINE PLEADER. 143 

the unkindness of wishing the sainted and crowned 
one back to the nether valley ? 

It is Prayer , observe, which thus brings the eye 
and the heart near to heaven. It is Prayer which 
opens the celestial portals, and gives to the soul 
a sight of the. invisible. 

Tes ; ye who may be now weeping in un- 
availing sorrow- over the departed, remember, in 
conjunction with the tears, the prayers of Jesus. 
Many a desolate mourner derives comfort from the 
thought — u Jesus wept." Forget not this other 
simple entry in our touching narrative, telling 
where the spirit should ever rest amid the shadows 
of death — " Jesus lifted up Ms eyes, and said, Father, 
I thank Thee that Thou hast heard me. And I knew 
that Thou hear est rue always" * 

Let us gather for a little around this incident in 
the story of Bethany. It is one of the many golden 
sayings of priceless value. 

That utterance has at this moment lost none of 
its preciousness ; that voice, silent on earth, is still 
eloquent in heaven.. The Great Intercessor still is 
there, " walking in the midst of the seven golden 

• John xi. 41, 



144 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

candlesticks;" loving to note all the wants and 
weaknesses, the necessities and distresses, of every 
Church, and every member of His Church, What 
He said of old to Peter, He says to every trembling 
believer — u I have prayed, and am praying for 
thee, that thy faith fail not!" " For thee!" 
We must not merge the interest which Jesus has 
in each separate member of His family, in His in- 
tercession for the Church in general. While He 
lets down His censer, and receives into it, for pre- 
sentation on the golden altar, the prayers of the 
vast aggregate ; while, as the true High Priest, He 
enters the holiest of all with the names of His 
spiritual Israel on His breastplate — carrying the 
burden of their hourly needs to the foot of the 
mercy-seat; — yet still, He pleads, as if the case 
of each stood separate and alone ! He remem- 
bers thee j dejected Mourner, as if there were no 
other heart but thine to be healed, and no other 
tears but thine to be dried. His own words, 
speaking of believers, not collectively but indivi- 
dually, are these — u I will confess his name before 
my Father and his angels." * " Who touched 

* Rev. iii. 5. 



THE DIVINE PLEADER. 145 

me ? " was His interrogation once on earth, as His 
discriminating love was conscious of some special 
contact amid the press of the multitude, — " Some- 
body hath touched me ! " If we can say, in the 
language of Paul's appropriating faith, " He loved 
me, and gave Himself for me," we can add, He 
pleads for me, and bears me! He bears this 
very heart of mine, with all its weaknesses, and 
infirmities, and sins, before His Father's throne. 
He has engraven each stone of His Zion on the 
"palins of His hands," and " its walls are con- 
tinually before Him ! " 

How untiring, too, in His advocacy ! What has 
the Christian so to complain of, as his own cold, 
unworthy prayers — mixed so with unbelief — soiled 
with worldliness — sometimes guiltily omitted or 
curtailed. Not the fervid ejaculations of those 
feelingly alive to their spiritual exigencies, but 
listless, unctionless, the hands hanging down, the 
knees feeble and trembling ! 

But notwithstanding all, Jesus pleads! Still 
the Great Intercessor " waits to be gracious." He 
is at once Moses on the mountain^ and Joshua on 
the battle-plain — fighting with us in the one ; pray- 



146 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

ing for us in the other. No Aarons or Hitrs 
needed to sustain His sinking strength, for it is 
His sublime prerogative neither to " faint nor grow 
weary ! " There is no loftier occupation for faith 
than to speed upwards to the throne and behold 
that wondrous Pleader, receiving at one moment, 
and at every moment, the countless supplications 
and prayers which are coming up before Him 
from every corner of His Church. The Sinner 
just awoke from his moral slumber, and in the 
agonies of conviction, exclaiming, u What must 
I do to be saved? " — The Procrastinator sending 
up from the brink of despair the cry of importu- 
nate agony. — The Backslider wailing forth his 
bitter lamentation over guilty departures, and foul 
ingratitude, and injured love. — The Sick man 
feebly groaning forth, in undertones of suffering, 
his petition for succour. — The Dying, on the brink 
of eternity, invoking the presence and support of 
the alone arm which can be of any avail to them. 
— The Bereaved, in the fresh gush of their sorrow, 
calling upon Him who is the healer of the broken- 
hearted. But all heard! Every tear marked — > 
every sigh registered — every suppliant succoured. 



THE DIVINE PLEADER. 147 

Amalek may come threatening nothing but dis- 
comfiture ; but that pleading Voice on the heavenly 
Hill is " greater far than all that can be against 
us ! ' He pleads for His elect in every phase of 
their spiritual history — He pleads for their in- 
bringing into His fold — He pleads for their perse- 
verance in grace — He pleads for their deliverance 
at once from the accusations and the power of 
Satan — He pleads for their growing sanctifica- 
tion ; — and when the battle of life is over. He 
uplifts His last pleading voice for their complete 
glorification. The intercession of Jesus is the 
golden key which unlocks the gates of Paradise 
to the departing soul. At a saint's dying mo- 
ments we are too often occupied with the lower 
earthly scene to think of the heavenly. The tears 
of surrounding relatives cloud too often the more 
glorious revelations which faith discloses. But in 
the muffled stillness of that death-chamber, when 
each is holding his breath as the King of Terrors 
passes by — if we could listen to it, we should heai 
the " Prince who has power with God" thus utter- 
ing His final prayer, and on the rushing wings oi 
ministering angels receiving an answer while He 



148 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY. 

is yet speaking — u Father, I will that they also, 
whom thou hast given ine ; "be with me where I 
am, that they may behqjd my glory ! " 

Reader ! exult more and more in this all-pre- 
vailing Advocate. See that ye approach the 
mercy-seat with no other trust but in His atoning 
work and meritorious righteousness. There was 
but One solitary man of the whole human race 
who, of old, in the Jewish temple, was permitted 
to speak face to face with Jehovah. There is but 
ONE solitary Being in the vast universe of God 
who, in the heavenly sanctuary, can effectually 
plead in behalf of His Spiritual Israel. " Seeing, 
then, that we have a Great High Priest passed 
into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, ... let 
us come boldly to the throne of grace." If Jesus 
delights in asking, God delights in bestowing. Let 
us put our every want, and difficulty, and per- 
plexity, in His hand, feeling the precious assur- 
ance, that all which is really good for us will b3 
given, and all that is adverse will, in equal mercy, 
be withheld. There is no limitation set to our 
requests. The treasury of grace is flung wide open 
for every suppliant. u Verily, verily, I say unto 



THE DIVINE PLEADER. 149 

you, whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my 
name He will give it you." Surely we may cease 
to wonder that the Great Apostle should have 
clung with such intense interest to this elevating 
theme — the Saviour's intercession; — that in his 
brief, but most comprehensive and beautiful creed,* 
he should have so exalted, as he does, its relative 
importance, compared with other cognate truths. 
" It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen 
again, who is even at the right hand of God, vjJio 
also maketh intercession for us." Climbing, step 
by step, in the upward ascent of Christian faith 
and hope, he. seems only to " reach the height of 
his great argument" when he stands on " the moun- 
tain of myrrh and the hill of frankincense." There, 
gazing on the face of the great officiating Priest 
who fills all heaven with His fragrance, and feel- 
ing that against that intercession the gates of hell 
can never prevail, he can utter the challenge to 
devils, and angels, and men, " Who shall separate 
us from the love of*Christ ? n 

* Kom. viii. 34 



XVI. 



&\t (Bmm^imi Summons. 

The moment has now come for the voice of Omni- 
potence to give the mandate. The group have 
gathered around the sepulchral grotto — the Re- 
deemer stands in meek majesty in front — the 
teardrop still glistening in His eye, and that eye 
directed heavenward ! Martha and Mary are gaz- 
ing on His countenance in dumb emotion, while 
the eager bystanders bend over the removed stone 
to see if the dead be still there. Yes ! there the 
captive lies — in uninvaded silence — attired still in 
the same solemn drapery. The Lord gives the 
word. u Lazarus come forth ,4T peals through the 
silent vault. The dull, cold ear seems to listen. 
The pulseless heart begins to beat — the rigid 
limbs to move — Lazarus lives/ He rises girt in 



THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. 151 

the swaddling-bands of the tomb, once more to 
walk in the light of the living. 

Where Scripture is silent, it is vain for us to 
picture the emotions of that moment, when the 
w T eeping sisters found the gloomy hours of discon- 
solate sorrow all at once rolled away. The cry of 
mingled wonder and gratitude rings through that 
lonely graveyard, — " This our brother was dead, 
and is alive again ; he was lost, and is found ! " 

most wondrous power — Death vanquished in 
his own territory ! The sleepei* has awoke a 
moral Samson, snapping the withs with which 
the King of Terrors had bound him. The star 
of Bethlehem shines, and the Valley of Achor 
becomes a door of hope. The all-devouring de- 
stroyer has to relinquish his prey. 

Was the joy of that moment confined to these 
two bosoms? Nay! The Church of Christ in 
every age may well love to linger around the 
grave of Lazarus. *In Ms resurrection there is to 
His true people a sure pledge and earnest of their 
own. It was the first sheaf reaped by the 
mower's sickle anticipatory of the great Harvest- 
home of the Final da}- " when all that are in their 



152 MEMORIES OP BETHANY, 

graves" shall hear the same voice and shall u come 
forth."* 

Solemn, surely, is the thought that that same por- 
tentous miracle performed on Lazarus is one day 
to be performed on ourselves. Wherever we repose 
— whether, as he did ; in the quiet churchyard of our 
native village, or in the midst of the city's crowded 
cemetery, or far away amid the alien and stranger 
in some foreign shore, our dust shall be startled by 
that omnipotent summons. How shall we hear 
it ? Would it sound in our ears like the sweet tones 
of the silver trumpet of Jubilee ? Would it be to 
^gaze like Lazarus on the face of our best friend — 
to see Jesus bending over us in looks of ten- 
derness- — to hear the living tones of that same 
voice, whose accents were last heard in the dark 
valley, whispering hopes full of immortality? 
True, we have not to wait for a Saviour's love and 
presence till then. The hour of death is to the 
Christian the birthday of endfess life. Guardian 
angels are hovering around his dying pillow ready 
to waft his spirit into Abraham's bosom. u The 
souls of believers do immediately pass into glory." 

• John v. 29. 



THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. 153 

But the fall plenitude of their joy and bliss is re- 
served for the time when the precious but redeemed 
dust, which for a season is left to moulder in the 
tomb, shall become instinct with life — " the cor- 
ruptible put on incorruption, and the mortal im- 
mortality." The spirits of the just enter at death on 
u the inheritance of the saints in light j" but at the 
Resurrection they shall rise as separate orbs from 
the darkness and night of the grave, each to " shine 
forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." 
However glorious the emancipation of the soul 
in the moment of dissolution, it is not until the 
plains and valleys of our globe shall stand 
thick with the living of buried generations — 
each glorified body the image of its Lord's — that 
the predicted anthem will be heard waking the 
echoes of the universe — u death, where is thy 
sting? grave, where is thy victory?" Then, with 
the organs of their resurrection-bodies ennobled, 
etherealised, purified from all the grossness of 
earth, they shall " behold the King in his beauty." 
" The King's daughter," all glorious without, u all 
glorious within "— " her clothing of wrought gold' : 
^—resplendent without with the robes of righteous* 



154 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

ness — radiant within with the beauties of holiness — « 
shall be brought "with gladness and rejoicing/' and 
u enter into the King's palace." This will form the 
full meridian of the saints' glory — the essence and 
climax of their new-born bliss — the full vision and 
fruition of a Saviour-God. " When He shall ap- 
pear, . . . we shall see Him as He is!" The first 
sight which will burst on the view of the Risen ones 
will be Jesus ! His hands will wreath the glorified 
brows, in presence of an assembled world, with the 
crown of life. From His lips will proceed the 
gladdening welcome— " Enter thou into the joy of 
thy Lord!" 

But this will not exhaust the elements of bliss in 
the case of the " perfected just" on the day of their 
final triumph. Though the presence of their ador- 
able Redeemer would be enough, and more than 
enough, to fill their cup with happiness, there will be 
others also to welcome them, and to augment their 
joy. Lazarus' Lord was not alone at the sepulchre's 
brink, at Bethany, ready to greet him back. Two 
loved sisters shared the joy of that gladsome hour. 
We jtre left to picture for ourselves the reunion, 
when ; with hand linked in hand, they retraversed 



THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. 155 

the road which had so recently echoed to the voice 
of mourning, and entered once more their home, 
radiant with a sunshine they had imagined to have 
passed away from it for ever ! 

So will it be with the believer on the morning 
of the Resurrection. While his Lord will be there, 
waiting to welcome him, there will be others 
ready with their presence to enhance the bliss of 
that gladdening restoration. Those whose smiles 
were last seen in the death-chamber of earth, now 
standing — not as Martha and Mary, with the tear 
on their cheek and the furrow of deep sorrow on 
their brow, but robed and radiant in resurrection 
attire, glowing with the anticipations of an ever- 
lasting and indissoluble reunion ! 

Can we anticipate, in the resurrection of Lazarus, 
our own happy history ? Yes ! happier history, 
for it will not then be to come forth once more, 
like him, into a w eeping world, to renew our work 
and warfare, feeling that restoration to life is only 
but a brief reprieve, and that soon again the irre- 
vocable sentence will and must overtake us ! Not 
like him, going to a home still covered with the 
drapery of sorrow, — a few transient years and the 



156 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

mournful funeral tragedy to be repeated, — but to 
enter into the region of endless life— to pass from 
the dark chambers of corruption into the peace 
and glories of our Heavenly Father's joyous Home, 
and " so to be for ever with the Lord ! " 

Sometimes it is with dying believers as with 
Lazarus. Their Lord, at the approach of death, 
seems to be absent. He who gladdened their homes 
and their hearts in life, is, for some mysterious 
reason, away in the hour of dissolution ; their 
spirits are depressed ; their faith languishes ; they 
are ready to say, u Where is now my God ? ,: But 
as He returned to Bethany to awake His sleeping 
friend, so will it be with all his true people, on 
that great day when the arm of death shall be for 
ever broken. If now united to Him by a living 
faith, — loved by Him as Lazarus was, and con- 
scious, however imperfectly, of loving Him back in 
return, — -we may go down to our graves, making 
Job's lofty creed and exclamation our own, u I 
know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall 
stand at the latter day upon the earth ; and though 
after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my 
flesh shall I see God." 



THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. 157 

One remark more. We have listened to the 
Omnipotent fiat, — " Lazarus, come forth ! " We 
have seen the ear of death starting at the summons, 
and the buried captive goes free ! Shall we fol- 
low the family group within the hallowed precincts 
of the Bethany dwelling? Shall fancy pour her 
strange and mysterious queries into the ear of him 
who has just come back from that land "from 
whose bourne no traveller returns?" He had 
been, in a far truer sense than Paul in an after 
year, in " Paradise" He must have heard un- 
speakable and unutterable words, " which it is not 
possible for a man to utter." He had looked upon 
the Sapphire Throne. He had ranged himself 
with the adoring ranks. He had strung his harp 
to the Eternal Anthem. When, lo ! an angel — a 
u ministering one" — whispers in his ear to hush his 
song, and speed him back again for a little season 
to the valley below. 

Startling mandate ! Can we suppose a remon- 
strance to so strange a summons ? What ! to be 
uncrowned and unglorified ! — Just after a few sips 
of the heavenly fountain, to be hurried away back 
again to the Yalley of Baca !— to gather up once 



158 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

more the soiled earthly garments and the pilgrim 
staff, and from the pilgrim rest and the victor's 
palm to encounter the din and dust and scars 
of battle ! What ! — just after having wept his 
final tear, and fougnt the last and the most terrible 
foe, to have his eye again dimmed with sorrow, 
and to have the thought before him of breasting a 
second time the swellings of Jordan ! 

"The Lord hath need of thee/' is all the reply. 
It is enough ! He asks no more ! That glorious 
Redeemer had left a far brighter throne and heri- 
tage for him. ■ Lazarus, come forth ! sounds in his 
old world-home, whence his spirit had soared, 
and in his beloved Master's words, on a mightier 
embassy, he can say, — u Lo> I come ! I delight to 
do thy will, my God." 

Or do other questions involuntarily arise ? What 
was the nature of his happiness while " absent 
from the body ? ' What the scenery of that bright 
abode ? Had he mingled in the goodly fellowship 
of prophets? Had he conversed with Abraham, 
and Isaac, and Jacob ? Was his spirit stationary — 
hovering w T ith a brotherhood of spirits within 
some holy limit — or, was he permitted to travel 



THE OMNIPOTENT SUMMONS. 159 

far and jiear in errands of love and mercy ? Had 
Bethany been revisited during that mysterious 
interval? Had he been the unseen witness of the 
tears and groans of his anguished sisters ? 

But hush, too, these vain inquiries. We dare not 
give rein to imagination where Inspiration is silent. 
There is a designed mystery about the circumstan- 
tials of a future state. Its scenery and locality we 
know nothing of. It is revealed to us -only in its 
character. We are permitted to approach its gates, 
and to read the surmounting inscription, — " With- 
out holiness no man shall see the Lord." Further 
we cannot go. Be it ours, like Lazarus, to attain a 
meetness for heaven, by becoming more and more 
like Lazarus' Bedeemer ! " We shall he like Him," 
is the brief but comprehensive Bible description of 
that glorious world. Saviour-like here, wq shall have 
heaven begun on earth, and lying dowTL like Lazarus 
in the sweet sleep of death, when our Lord comes, 
on the great day-dawn of immortality, we shall be 
satisfied when we awake in His likeness I » 

"Lie that was dead rose up and spoke — He spoke ! 
Was it of that majestic world unknown 1 
Those words which first the bier's dread silence broke— 

Came they with revelation in each tone 1 

■' 



160 



MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 



Were the far cities of the nations gone, 

The solemn halls of consciousness or sleep, 
For man uncurtain'd by that spirit lone, 

Back from' the portal summon'd o'er the deep? 
Be hush'd, my soul ! the veil of darkness lay 

Still drawn ; therefore thy Lord called back the vo^ce departed, 

To spread His truth, to comfort the weak-hearted ; 
Not to reveal the mysteries of its way. 

Oh ! take that lesson home in silent faith ; 

Put on submissive strength to meet, not question death/' 







XVII. 



t %m of (Bmtmmt 



Once more we visit in thought a peaceful and 
happy home-scene in the same Bethan y household. 
The severed links in that broken chain are again 
united. 

How often in a time of severe bereavement; 
when some "light of the dwelling" has suddenly 
been extinguished, does the imagination fondly 
dwell on the possibility of the wild dream of sepa- 
ration passing away; of the vacant seat being 
refilled by its owner — the "loved and lost one" 
again restored. Alas ! in all such cases, it is but 
a feverish vision, destined to know no fulfilment. 
Here, however, it was indeed a happy reality. 
"Lazarus is dead!' was the bitter dirge a few 
brief weeks ago ; but now, " Lazarus lives." His 
silent vcice is heard again — his dull eye is lighted 



162 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

again — the temporary pang of separation is only 
remembered to enhance the joy of so gladsome a 
reunion. 

It was on a Sabbath evening, the last Sabbath 
but. one of the waning Jewish dispensation, when 
Spring's loveliness was carpeting the Mount of 
Olives and clothing with fresh verdure the groves 
around Bethany, that our blessed Redeemer was 
seen approaching the haunt of former friendship. 
He had fo* two months taken shelter from the 
malice of the Sanhedrim in the little town of 
Ephraim and the mountainous region of Perea, on 

the other side of the Jordan. But the Passover 

j. 

solemnity being at hand, and his own hour having 
come, he had " set His face steadfastly to go to Je- 
rusalem." It is more than probable that for several 
days He had been travelling in the company of 
other pilgrims coming from Galilee on their way 
to the feast. He seems, however, to have left the 
festival caravan at Jericho, lingering behind with 
his own disciples in order to secure a private ap- 
proach to the city of solemnities. They were 
completing their journey on the Sabbath referred 
to just as the sun was sinking behind the brow of 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 163 

Olivet, and ; turning aside from the highway, they 
spent the night in their old Bethany retreat. Be- 
fitting tranquil scene for His closing Sabbath — a 
happy preparation for a season of trial and conflict ! 
It is well worthy of observation, how, as His saddest 
hours were drawing near — the shadow of His cross 
projected on His path — Bethany becomes more 
and more endeared to Him. Night after night, 
during this memorable week, we shall find Him 
resorting to its cherished seclusion. As the storm 
is fast gathering, the vessel seeks for shelter in its 
best-loved haven.* 

Imagine the joy with which the announcement 
would be received by the inmates — " Our Lord and 
Redeemer is once more approaching." Imagine 
how the great Conqueror of death would be wel- 
comed into the home consecrated alike by His love 
and power. Now every tear dried! The weeping 
that endured for the long night of bereavement all 
forgotten. Ah ! if Jesus were loved before in that 
happy home, how, we may well imagine, would 

* As the Jewish Sabbath began at six o'clock on Friday evening, 
and lasted till six on Saturday evening, we may infer it was after the 
tlose of its sacred hours (at " eventide ") He reached Bethany. 



164 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY, 

He Tbe adored and reverenced now« What a new 
claim had He established on their deepest affection 
and regard. Feelingly alivs to all they owed 
Hiin, the restored brother and rejoicing sisters 
with hearts overflowing with gratitude could say, 
in the words of their Psalmist King — u Thou 
hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with 
gladness, to the end that my glory may sing 
praise to thee, and not be silent. Lord my God, 
I will give thanks unto thee for ever!" 

But does the love and affection of that house- 
hold find expression in nothing but words? 
Supper is being made ready. While Martha, with 
her wonted activity, is busied preparing the even- 
ing meal — doing her best to provide for the re- 
freshment of the travellers — the gentle spirit of 
Mary (even if her name had not been given, we 
should have known it was she) prompts her to a 
more significant j)roof of the depth of her gratitude. 
Some fragrant ointment of spikenard — contained, 
as we gather from the other Evangelists, in a box 
of Alabaster — had been procured by her at great 
cost;* either obtained for this anticipated meeting 

* It is supposed to have been equivalent to £10 of our monej* 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 165 

with her Lord, or it may in some way have fallen 
into her possession, and been sacredly kept among 
her treasured gifts till some befitting occasion oc- 
curred for its employment. Has not that occasion 
occurred now? On whom can her grateful heart 
more joyously bestow this garnered treasure than 
on her beloved Lord. With her own hands she 
pours it on His feet. Stooping down, she wipes 
them, in further token of her devotion, with her 
loosened tresses, till the whole apartment was filled 
with the sweet perfume. 

And what was it that constituted the value of 
this tribute — the beauty and expressiveness of the 
action ? She gave her Lord the best thing she had! 
She felt that to Him, in addition to what He had 
done for her own soul, she owed the most valued 
life in the world. 

" Her eyes are homes of silent prayer, 
Nor other thought her mind admits ; 
But, he was dead, and there he sits, 
And He that brought him back is there. 

" Then one deep love doth supersede 
All other, when her ardent gaze 
Roves from the living brother's faoe 
And rests upon the Life indeed. 



166 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

*' All subtle thought, all curious fears, 
Borne down by gladness so complete ; 
She bows, she bathes the Saviour's feet 
With costly spikenard and with tears. " * 

What a lesson for lis ! Are we willing to give 
our Lord the best of what we have — to consecrate 
time, talents, strength, life, to His service? Not 
as many, to give Him the mere dregs and sweep- 
ings of existence — the wrecks of a " worn and 
withered love" — but, like Mary, anxious to take 
every opportunity and occasion of testifying the 
depth of obligation under which we are laid to 
Him ? Let us not say — " My sphere is lowly, my 
means are limited, my best offerings would be 
inadequate." Such, doubtless, were the very feel- 
ings of that humble, diffident, yet loving one, as 
she crept noiselessly to where her pilgrim-Lord 
reclined, and lavished on His weary limbs the cost- 
liest treasure she possessed. Hundreds of more 
imposing deeds — more princely and munificent 
offerings — may have been left unrecorded by the 
Evangelists ; but " wherever this Gospel shall be 
preached, in the whole world, there shall also this 

* Tennyson. 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 167 

that this woman hath done be told for a memorial 
of her."* 

Would that love to "that same Jesus" were 
with all of us more paramount than it is ! "Lovest 
thou Me more than these " is His own searchirg 
test and requirement. Is it so ? — Do we love Him 
more than self or sin — more than friends or home 
— more than any earthly object or earthly good ; 
and are we willing, if need be, to make a sacrifice 
for His glory and for the honour of His cause ? 
Happy for us if it be so. There will be a joy in 
the very consciousness of making the effort, feeble 
and unworthy as it may be, for His sake, and in 



* 



An excellent Christian poet has thus amplified this thought :— 

u Thou hast thy record in the monarch's hall, 

And on the waters of the far mid sea; 
And where the mighty-mountain shadows fall, 

The Alpine hamlet keeps a thought of thee. 
"Where'er, beneath some Oriental tree, 

The Christian traveller rests — where'er the child 
Looks upward from the English mother's knee, 

With earnest eyes, in wond'ring reverence mild, 
There art thou known. Where'er the Book of Light 

Bears hope and healing, there, heyond all blight, 
Is borne thy memory — and all praise above. 

Oh t say what deed so lifted thy sweet name, 
Mary ! to that pure, silent place of fame 1 — 

One lowly offering of exceeding love.* 






168 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

acknowledgment of the great love wherewith He 
hath loved us. 



a 



Thrice blest, whose lives are faithful prayers, 
Whose loves in higher Love endure ; 
Whose souls possess themselves so pure, 

Oris there blessedness like theirs]" 






Let it be our privilege and delight to give Him 
our pound of spikenard, whatever that may he; 
and if we can give no other, let us offer the frag- 
rant perfume of holy hearts and holy lives. That 
religion is always best which reveals itself by its 
effects — by kindness, gentleness, amiability, un- 
selfishness, flowing from a principle of grateful 
love to Him who, though unseen, has been to us 
as to the family of Bethany — Friend, and Help, 
and Guide, and Portion. Mary's honour was 
great to anoint her Lord^but the lowliest and 
humblest of His people may do the same. We 
may have no aromatic offering, neither "gold, 
nor frankincense, nor myrrh ; but My son, 
My daughter, " give Me thine heart." a The 
sacrifices of God are a broken spirit ; a broken 
and a contrite heart ; God, thou wilt not de- 
spise.' 1 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 169 

Nor ought we to forget our blessed Lord's reply, 
when Judas objected to the waste of the ointment 
— a Let her alone ; . . . • the poor ye have 
always with you, but Me ye have not always" Let 
us seek to make the most of our Lord's visits 
while we have Him. The visits of Jesus to 
Bethany were soon to be over ; — so also with us. 
He will not always lifiger on our thresholds, if our 
souls refuse to receive Him, or yield Him nothing 
but coldness and ingratitude in return for His love. 
"Me ye have not always." Soon may sickness 
incapacitate for active service ! Soon may oppor- 
tunities for doing good be gone, and gone for ever ! 
Soon may death overtake us, and the alabaster 
box be left behind, unused and unemployed; the 
dying regret on our lips — " Oh that I had done 
more while I lived for this most precious Saviour ! 
but opportunities of testifying my gratitude to Him 
are now gone beyond recall." Good deeds per- 
formed on Gospel motives, though unknown and 
unvalued by the world, will not go unrecompensed 
or unowned by Him who values the cup of cold 
water given in His name. u God is not unmindful 
to forget our work of faith and our labour of love." 



170 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

The Lamb's Book of Life registers every such 
deed of lowly piety ; and on the Great Day of ac- 
count u it shall be produced to our eternal honour, 
and rewarded with a reward of grace, though not 
of debt." 

Let us bear in mind, also, that every holy ser- 
vice of unostentatious love exercises a hallowed 
influence on those around v&. We may not be 
conscious of such. But, if Christians indeed, the 
sphere in which we move will, like the Bethany 
home, be redolent with the ointment perfume. A 
holy life is a silent witness for Jesus— an incense- 
cloud from the heart-altar, breathing odours and 
sweet spices, of which the world cannot fail to take 
knowledge. Yes ! were we to seek for a beautiful 
allegorical representation of pure and undefiled 
Religion, we would find it in this loveliest of in- 
spired pictures. Mary — all silent and submissive 
at the feet of her Lord — only permitting her love 
to be disclosed by the holy perfume which, un- 
known to herself, revealed to others the reality and 
intensity of her love. True religion is quiet, un- 
obtrusive, seeking the shade— its ever-befitting 
attitude at the feet of Jesus, looking to Him as all 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 171 

in all. Yet, though retiring, it must and will 
manifest its living and influential power. The 
heart broken at the cross, like Mary's "broken 
box, begins from that hour to give forth the hal- 
lowed perfume of faith, and love, and obedience, 
and every kindre v d grace. Not a fitful and vacil- 
lating love and service, but ever emitting the fra- 
grance of holiness, till the little world of home 
influence around us is filled with the odour of the 
ointment. 

" I ask Thee for the daily strength, 

To none that ask denied ; 
And a mind to blend with outward life, 

While keeping by Thy side ; 
Content to fill a little space 

If Thou be glorified. 

•' And if some things I do not ask 

In my cup of blessings be, 
I would have my spirit fill'd the more 

With grateful love to Thee — 
More careful not to serve Thee much, 

But to please Thee perfectly." 

Such is a brief sketch of this beautiful domestic 
scene, and its main practical lessons, — a green 
spot on which the eye will ever love to repose, 
among the "Memories of Bethany." It is un- 



172 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

necessary to advert to the controverted question, 
as to whether the description of the anointing, 
which took place in the house of Simon the leper 
(as recorded in Matt. xxvi. 6-14, and Mark 
xiv.^ 3), and where the alabaster box is spoken 
of, be identical with this passage, or whether 
they refer to two distinct occasions. The question 
is of no great importance in itself — the former 
view (that they are descriptions of one and the 
same event) seems the more probable. It surely 
gives a deep intensity to the interest of the nar- 
rative to imagine the Leper and the raised dead 
man, seated at the same table together with their 
common Deliverer, glorifying their Saviour-God, 
with bodies and spirits they felt now to be doubly 
His ! Simon, it is evident, must have been cured 
of his disease, else, by the Jewish law, he dared 
not have been associating with his friends at a 
common meal. How was he cured ? How else 
may we suppose was that inveterate malady sub- 
dued but by the omnipotent word of Him, who 
had only to say, — " I will, be thou made whole !" 
May we not regard him as a standing miracle of 
Jesus' power over the diseased body, as Lazarus 



t 



THE BOX OF OINTMENT. 173 

was the living trophy of His power over death 
and the grave, The one could testify, — " This 
poor man cried, and the Lord saved him, and de- 
livered him out of all his troubles." The other, — 
u Unless the Lord had been my help, my soul 
must now have dwelt in silence ! " 

In order to explain the circumstance of this 
family meeting being in the house of Simon, there 
have not been wanting advocates for the suppo- 
sition, that the restored leper may have been none 
other than the parent of the household.* It is not 
for us to hazard conjectures, where Scripture has 
thrown no light. Even when sanctioned by vene- 
rated names, the most plausible hypothesis should 
be received with that caution requisite in dealing 
with what is supported exclusively by traditional 
authority. Were, however, such a view as we have 
indicated correct (which is just possible, and there 
is nothing in the face of the narrative to render it 
■improvable), it certainly would impart a new and 
fresh beauty to the picture of this Feast of grati- 
tude. Well might the parentis heart swell within 
him with more than ordinary emotions ! Himself 

* This w*s a common opinion among the Fathers of the Church. 



174 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

plucked a victim from the most loathsome of 
diseases ! He would think , with tearful eye, of 
the dark dungeon of his banishment — the lazar- 
house, where he had been gloomily excluded 
from all fellowship with human sympathies and 
loving hearts. His own children condemned by 
a severe but righteous necessity to shun his pre- 
sence — or when within sound of human footfall or 
human voice ; compelled to make known his pre- 
sence with the doleful utterance,—" Unclean ! Un- 
clean!" He would think of that wondrous mo- 
ment in his history, when, shunned by man, the 
God-man drew near to him, and with one glance 
of His love, and one utterance of His power, He . 
bade the foul disease for ever away ! 

Nor was this all that Simon (if he icere y indeed, 
the father of the family) must have felt. What 
must have been those emotions, too deep for utter- 
ance, as he gazed on the son of his affections, 
seated once more by his side ! A short time ago, 
Lazarus had been laid silent in the adjoining 
sepulchre — Death had laid his cold hand upon 
him — the pride of his home had been swept down. 
But the same Almighty friend who had caused his 



THE EOX OF OINTMENT. 175 

own leprosy to depart, had given him back his lost 
one. They were rejoicing together in the presence 
of Him to whom they owed life and all its bless- 
ings. Oh, well might " the voice of rejoicing and 
salvation be heard in the tabernacles of these 
righteous ! " Well might the head of the house- 
hold dictate to Mary to " bring forth their best " 
and bestow it on their Deliverer — the costliest gift 
which the dwelling contained — the prized and 
valued box of alabaster, and pour its contents on 
His feet ! We can imagine the burden, if not the 
words, of their joint anthem of praise, — iC Bless 
the Lord, our souls, and forget not all his bene- 
fits, who forgiveth all our iniquities, who healeth 
all our diseases^ who redeemeth our lives from de- 
struction, and crowneth us with loving-kindness 
and with tender mercy." 

But be all this as it may, that same great Phy- 
sician of Souls still wait& to be gracious. He 
healeth ALL our diseases.* Young and old', rich 
and poor, every type of spiritual malady has in 
Him and His salvation its corresponding cure. 
The same Lord is rich to all that call upon Him. 
The ardent Martha, the contenfplative Mary, the 



176 MEMORIES OF BETHANY, 

aged Simon, Lazarus the loving and beloved — Ha 
has proved friend, and help, and Saviour to all; 
and in their several ways they seek to give ex- 
pression to the depth of their gratitude. Happy 
home ! may there be many such amongst us ! Fa- 
thers, brothers, sisters, "loving one another with a 
pure heart fervently, 7 ' and loving Jesus more than 
all — and themselves in Jesus! Seeking to have 
Him as the ever-welcomed guest of their dwelling 
— feeling that all they have, and all they are, for 
time or for eternity, they owe to Him who has 
u brought them out of the horrible pit, and out of 
the miry clay, and set their feet upon a rock, and 
established their goings, and put a new song in 
their mouth, even praise unto our God ! ' 

Yes ! having the Lord, we have what is better 
and more enduring than the best of earthly ties and 
earthly homes. This must have been impressed 
with peculiar force on aged John, as in distant 
Ephesus he penned the memories of this evening 
feast. Where were then all its guests? — the re- 
covered leper, the risen Lazarus, the devout sisters, 
the ardent disciples — all gone ! — none but himself 
regained to tell tie touching story. Nay, not all J 



TJ1E BOX OF OINTMENT. 177 

— One remained amid this wreck of buried friend- 
ship — the adorable Being who had given to that 
Bethany feast all its imperishable interest was 
still within him and about him. The rocky shores 
of Patmos, and the groves around Ephesus, echoed 
to the well-remembered tones of the same voice of 
love. His test Friend was still left to take loneli- 
ness from his solitude. He writes as if he were 
still reclining on that sacred bosom — " Truly our 
fellowship is with the Father and with his Son 
Jesus Christ!" 

Reader ! take " that same Jesus " now as your 
Friend — receive Him as the guest of your soul ; and 
when other guests and other friendships are 
vanished and gone, and you may be left like 
John, as the alone survivor of a buried genera- 
tion ; — " alone ! you will yet be not atone !*' — lifting 
your furrowed brow and tearful eye to Heaven, 
you may exclaim, " Who shall separate me from 
the love of Christ?" 



XVIII. 

|P aim ^ratu^s. 

We have just been contemplating a beautiful epi- 
sode in the Bethany Memories — a gleam amid 
gathering clouds. Martha, Mary, and Lazarus! 
With what happy hearts did they hail the presence 
of their Lord on the evening of that Jewish Sab- 
bath ! Little did they anticipate the events im- 
pending. Little did they dream that their Almighty 
Deliverer and Friend would that day week be 
sleeping in His own grave ! 

These were indeed eventful hours on which they 
had now entered. The stir through Palestine of 
the thousands congregating in the earthly Jeru- 
salem to the great Paschal Feast, was but a feeble 
type of the profound interest with which myriad 
angel-worshippers in the Jerusalem above were 
gathering to witness the offering of the True 



PALM BEANCHES. 179 

Paschal Sacrifice, u the Lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world." 

On the morning after the supper at Bethany 
(probably that of our Sabbath), the Saviour rose 
from His couch of needed rest to approach Jem- 
saleun The reserve hitherto maintained as to His 
kingly power is now to be set aside. " The hour 
is come in which the Son of man is to be glorified." 
Bethany is one of the few places associated with 
recollections of the Redeemer's royalty. The 
u despised and rejected" is, for once, the honoured 
and exalted. It is a glimpse of the crown before 
He ascends the cross ; a foreshadowing of that 
blessed period when He shall be hailed by the 
loud acclaim of earth's nations — the Gentile ho- 
sannah mingling with the Hebrew hallelujah in 
welcoming Him to the throne of universal empire. 

Multitudes of the assembled pilgrims in the city, 
who had heard of His arrival, crowded out' to 
Bethany to witness the mysterious Being, whoso 
deeds of mercy and miracle had now become the 
universal theme of converse. His mightiest prodigy 
of power in the resurrection of Lazarus had invested 
His name and person with surpassing interest. We 



180 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

need not wonder, therefore, that " the town of Mary 
and her sister Martha" should attract many wor- 
shippers from Jerusalem, to behold with their own 
eyes at once the restored villager and his Divine 
Deliverer! In fulfilment of Zechariah's prophecy, 
the meek and lowly Nazarene, seated -on no ca- 
parisoned war-horse, but on an unbroken colt, and 
surrounded with the multitude, sets forth on His 
journey. * a The village and the desert were then 
all alive (as they still are once every year at the 
Greek Easter) with the crowd of Paschal pilgrims 
moving to and fro between Bethany and Jeru- 
salem Three pathways lead, and probably 

always led, from Bethany ;........ one a 

long circuit over the northern shoulder of Mount 
Olivet, down the valley which parts it from 
Scopus ; another, a steep footpath over the sum- 
mit ; the third, the natural continuation of the 
road by which mounted travellers always approach 
the city from Jericho, over the southern shoulder 
between the summit which contains the Tombs of . 
the Prophets, and that called the ' Mount of Offence.' 
There can be no doubt that this last is the road 

• Mark xi. 1-12. 



PALM BRANCHES. 181 

of the entry of Christ, not only . because, as just 
stated, it is, and must always have been, the usual 
approach for horsemen and for large caravans such 
as then were concerned, but also, because this is 
the only one of the three approaches which meets 
the requirements of the narrative which follows. 

This is the only one approach which 

is really grand. It is the approach by which the 
army of Pompey advanced, the first European army 
that ever confronted it. Probably the first impres- 
sion of every one coming from the north-west and 
the south may be summed up in the simple expres- 
sion used by one of the modern travellers — c I am 
strangely affected, but greatly disappointed ! ' 
But no human being could be disappointed who 
first saw Jerusalem from the east. The beauty 
consists in this, that vou then burst at once on the 
two great ravines which cut the city off from the 
■surrounding table-land. 

• ••••• 

u Two vast streams of people met on that day. 
The one poured out from the city, and as they 
came through the gardens whose clusters of 
palms rose on the south-eastern corner of Olivet, 



182 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

they cut down the long branches, as was their wont 
at the Feast of Tabernacles, and moved upwards 
towards Bethany with loud shouts of welcome. 
From Bethany streamed forth the crowds who had 
assembled there on the previous night, and who 
came testifying to the great event at the sepulchre 
of Lazarus. The road soon loses sight of Bethany. 
It is now a rough, but still broad and well-defined 
mountain track, winding over rock and loose stones, 
— a steep declivity below on the left ; the sloping 
shoulder of Olivet above on the right. Along this 
road the multitudes threw down the branches 
which they cut as they went along, or spread out 
a rude matting formed of the palm branches they 
had already cut as they came out. The larger 
portion (those perhaps who escorted Him from 
Bethany) unwrapped their loose cloaks from their 
shoulders, and stretched them along the rough 
path, to form a momentary carpet as he approached. 
The two streams met midway. Half of the vast 
mass, turning round, preceded ; the other half fol- 
lowed. Gradually the long procession swept up 
and over the ridge, where first begins the c descent 
of the Mouut of Olives/ towards Jerusalem. At 



PALM BRANCHES. 183 

this point the first view is caught of the south- 
eastern corner of the city. The Temple and the 
more northern portions are hid by the slope of 
Olivet on the right ; what is seen is only Mount 
Zion, covered with houses to its base, surmounted 
by the castle of Herod on the supposed site of 
the palace of David, from which that portion of 
Jerusalem, emphatically * The City of David/ 
derived its name. It was at this precise point, 
as he drew near, at the descent of the Mount of 
Olives, (may it not have been from the sight thus 
opening upon them ?) that the shout of triumph 
burst forth from the multitude — i Hosannah to the 
Son of David ! Blessed is he that cometh in the 
name of the Lord ! Blessed is the kingdom that 
cometh of our father David. Hosannah — Peace — 
Glory in the highest ! ' There was a pause as the 
shout rang through the long defile ; and as the 
Pharisees who stood by in the crowd complained, 
He pointed to the i stones,' which ? strewn beneath 
their feci;, would immediately 'cry out' if 'these 
were to hold their peace.' Again the procession 
advanced. The road descends a slight declivity, 
ard the glimpse of the city is again withdrawn 



184 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

behind the intervening ridge of Olivet. A few 
moments, and the path mounts again, it climbs a 
rugged ascent, it reaches a ledge of smooth rock, 
and in an instant the whole city bursts into view. 
As now the dome of the • Mosque El Aksa rises 
like a ghost from the earth before the traveller 
stands on the ledge, so then must have risen the 
Temple Tower ; as now the vast enclosure of the 
Mussulman Sanctuary, so then must have spread 
the Temple Courts ; as now the gray town on its 
broken hills, so then the magnificent city with its 
background (long since vanished away) of gardens 
and suburbs on the western plateau behind. Im- 
mediately below was the valley of the Kedron, 
here seen in it* greatest depth, as it joins the 
valley of Hinnom ; and thus giving full effect to the 
great peculiarity of Jerusalem, seen only on its 
eastern side — its situation as of a city rising out of 
a deep abyss. It is hardly possible to doubt that 
this rise and turn of the road (this rocky ledge) 
was the exact point where the multitude paused 
again, and l He, when He beheld the city, wept 
over it.' Here the Lord stayed His on- 
ward march ; and here His eyes beheld what ia 



PALM BRANCHES. 185 

still the most impressive view which the neigh- 
bourhood of Jerusalem furnishes — and the tears 
rushed forth at the sight."* 

Without dwelling longer on this splendid ova- 
tion, we may only further remark, that had the 
Redeemer's mission been on (the infidel theory) a 
successful imposture, what an opportunity now to 
have availed Himself of that outburst of popular 
fervour, and to have marched straight to take pos- 
session of the hereditary throne of David. The 
populace were evidently more than ready to second 
any such attempt; the Sanhedrim and Jewish 
authorities must have trembled for the result. The 
Jiosannas, borne on the breeze from the slope of 
Olivet, could not fail to sound ominous of coming 
disaster. So incontrovertible indeed had been 
the proof of Lazarus' resurrection, that only the 
most blinded bigotry could refuse to own in that 
marvellous act the divinity of Jesus. In addition, 
too, to this last crowning demonstration of omni- 
potence, there were hundreds, we may well believe, 
in that procession, who, in different parts of Pa- 

* Stanley's " Sinai and Palestine," p. 188-191. A work of rare inte- 
rest, which condenses in one volume the literature of the Holy Land. 



186 • MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

lestine, had listened to His gracious words, and 
witnessed His gracious deeds. What other, what 
letter Messiah could they wish than this — com- 
bining the might of Godhead with the kindness 
and tenderness of a human philanthropist and 
friend ? Is He to accept of the crown ? Nay, by 
a lofty abnegation of self, and all selfish considera- 
tions, He illustrates the announcement made by 
Him, a few hours later, in Pilate's judgment-hall, 
as to the leading characteristic of that empire He 
is to set up in the hearts of men— " My kingdom 
is not of this world." He was, indeed, one day to 
be hailed • alike King of Zion and King of Na- 
tions, but a bitter baptism of blood and suffering 
had meanwhile to be undergone. No glitter of 
earthly honour — no carnal dreams of earthly glory 
— would divert Him from His divine and gracious 
undertaking. He would save others — Himself He 
would not save. 

Let us pause for a moment, and ponder that 
significant chorus of praise which on Olivet arose 
to the Lord of Glory. How interesting to think 
of the vast and varied multitude gathered around 
the Conqueror ! Many, doubtless, assembled from 



PALM BRANCHES. 187 

curiosity, who had never seen Him before, and had 
only heard of His fame in their distant homes ; 
others, from feelings of personal love and gratitude, 
were blending their voices in the shout of wel- 
come. Think, it may be, of Bartimeus, now gaz- 
ing with his unsealed eyes on his Divine Deliverer. 
Think of Mary Magdalene, her heart gushing at 
the remembrance of her own sin and shame, and 
her adorable Redeemer's pardoning and forgiving 
mercy! Nicodemus, perhaps, no longer seeking 
to repair by stealth, under the shadow of night, 
to hold a confidential meeting ; but in the full 
blaze of day, and before assembled Israel, boldly 
recognising in "the Teacher sent from God" the 
premised Messiah, the Prince of Peace, the Re- 
deemer of Mankind. Shall we think of Lazarus 
too, fearless of his own personal safety, venturing 
to follow his guest with tearful eye, the multitude 
gazing with wonder on this living trophy of death ? 
We may think of the very children, as He entered 
the temple, uplifting their infant voices in the 
general welcome — pledges of the myriad little ones 
who, in future ages, were to have an interest in 
il the kingdom of God." 



188 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

u Meanwhile He paces through th' adoring crowd* 
Calm as the march of some majestic cloud 
That o'er wild scenes of ocean war 
Holds its still course in Heaven afar. 



" Yet in the throng of selfish hearts untrue, 
His sad eye rests upon His faithful few; 
Children and child-like souls are there, 
Blind Bartimeus' humble prayer ; • 
And Lazarus, waken'd from his four days' sleep, 
Enduring life again that Passover to keep." * 






May not Olivet be regarded on tliis occasion as 
a type of the Church triumphant in Heaven-*- 
Jesus enthroned in the affections of a mighty mul- 
titude which no man can number — old and young, 
great and small, rich and poor — casting their 
palms of victory at His feet, and ascribing to Him 
all the glory of their great salvation ? 

Let us ask, have we received Jesus as our King ? 
■ — have our palm branches been cast at His feet? 
Feeling that He is alike willing and mighty to 
save, have we joined in the rapture of praise — 
" Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the 
Lord to save us ?" Have our hearts become living 
temples thrown open for His reception? Is this 

♦ " Christian Year." 






PALM BRANCHES. • 189 

the motto and superscription on their portals — ■ 
iC This is the gate of the Lord, into which The 
Righteous One shall enter!" Jesus refused and 
disowned none of these gratulations — He spurned 
no voice in all that motley Jerusalem throng. 
There were endless diversities and phases, doubt- 
less, of human character and history there. The 
(face proud formalist, the once greedy extortioner, 
the hated tax-gatherer, the rich nobleman, the 
child of penury, the Roman officer, the peasant or 
fisherman of Galilee, the humbled publican, the 
woman from the city, the reclaimed victim' of 
misery and guilt! All were there as types and 
samples of that diversified multitude who, in every 
age, were to own Him as King, and receive His 
gracious benediction. 

We have spoken of this incident as a glimpse 
of glory before His sufferings. Alas ! it toas but 
a glimpse. What a picture of the fickleness and 
treachery of the heart! — That excited populace 
who are now shouting their hosannahs, are ere long 
to be raising « the cry, u Crucify Him, crucify 
Him!" Four days hence we shall find the palm 
"branches lying withered on the Bethany road, 



190 • MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

and the blazing torches of an assassin-band nigh 
the very spot where He is now passing with an 
applauding retinue ! " Cease ye from man, whose 
breath is in his nostrils." 

It does not belong to our narrative to record 
the remaining transactions of this day in Jerusalem. 
The shades of evening find the Saviour once more 
repairing to Bethany. The evangelist Mark, in 
the course of his narrative, simply but touchingly 
says : — " And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and 
into the temple, and when He had looked round 
about upon all things ' (the mitred priests, the 
bleeding victims, the costly buildings), "and now 
the eventide was come, he went out unto Bethany 
with the twelve." (Mark xi. 11.) As He re- 
turned to the sweet calm of that quiet home, if He 
could not fail to think of the hours of darkness and 
agony before Him, could He reap no joy or conso- 
lation in the thought, that that very day week 
the redemption of His people was to be consum- 
mated — the glory that surrounded the grave and 
resurrection of Lazarus was to be eclipsed by tho 
marvels of His own ! 



XIX. 

The hosannahs of yesterday had died away — the 
memorials of its triumph were strewed on the road 
across Olivet — as, early on the Monday morning, 
while the sun was just appearing above the 
Mountains of Moab, the Divine Redeemer left His 
Bethany retreat, and was seen retraversing the 
well-worn path to Jerusalem. Here and there, 
in the " olive-bordered way,** were Fig plantations. 
The adjoining village of Bethphage derived its 
name from the Green Fig.* Indeed, " fig-trees 
may still be seen overhanging the ordinary 
road from Jerusalem to Bethany, growing out 
of the rocks of the solid mountain, which, bv the 
prayer of faith, might l be removed and cast into 

* Bethphage, lit. " the house of figs," 



192 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

the (distant Mediterranean) Sea.' " * An incident 
connected with one of these is too intimately iden- 
tified with the Redeemer's last journeys to and 
from the home of His friend to admit of exclusion 
from our " Bethany Memories." These memories 
have hitherto, for the most part, in connexion at 
least with our blessed Lord, been soothing, hal- 
lowed, encouraging. Here the " still small voice" 
is for once broken with . sterner accents. In con- 
trast with the bright background of other sunny 
pictures, we have, standing out in bold relief, a 
withered, sapless stem, impressively proclaiming, 
in unwonted utterances of wrath and rebuke, that 
the same hand is " strong to smite," which we 
have witnessed so lately in the case of Lazarus 
was " strong to save." 

The eye of Jesus, as he traversed the rocky 
path with His disciples, rested on a Fig-tree. (Mark 
xi. 12,13.) It seems not to have been growing 
alone, but formed part of a group or plantation on 
one of the slopes or ravines of Olivet. Its appear- 
ance could not fail to challenge attention. It was 
now only the Passover season (the month of April) j 

• Stanley, p. 418. 






THE FIG-TKEE. 193 

summer — the time for ripe figs — was yet distant ; 
and as it is one of the peculiarities of the tree that 
the fruit appears before the leaves, a considerable 
period, in the ordinary course of nature, ought to 
have elapsed before the foliage was matured. 
Jesus Himself, it will be remembered, on another 
occasion, spake of the putting forth of the fig-tree 
leaves as an indication that " summer was nigh." 
It must have been, therefore, a strange and unusual 
sight which met the eye of the travellers as they 
gazed, in early spring, on one of these trees with 
its full complement of leaves — clad in full summer 
luxuriance. While the others in the plantation, 
true to the order of development, were yet bare 
and leafless, or else the buds of spring only flushing 
them with verdure, the broad leaves of this pre- 
cocious (and we may think at Gist favoured) plant — 
the pioneer of surrounding vegetation — rustled in 
the morning breeze, and invited the passers-by 
to turn aside, examine the marvel, and pluck the 
fruit. 

We may confidently infer that Jesus, as the 
Omniscient Lord of the inanimate creation, knew 



194 MEMORIES OF BETHANT, 

well that fruit there was none under that preten- 
tious foliage. We dare not suppose that He went 
expecting to find Figs ; far less ; that in a moment of 
disappointed hope, He ventured on a capricious 
exercise of His power, uttered a hasty malediction, 
and condemned the insensate boughs to barren- 
ness and decay. The first cursory reading of the 
narrative may suggest some such unworthy im- 
pression. But we dismiss it at once ; as strangely 
at variance with the Saviour's character; and 
strangely unlike His wonted actings. We feel 
assured that He literally, as well as figuratively, 
would not " break the bruised reed, nor quench 
the smoking flax." He came, in all respects, u not 
to destroy, but to save. 7 ' Some cleep inner mean- 
ing, not apparent on the surface of the inspired 
story, must have led Him for the moment to 
regard a tree in the light of a responsible agent, 
and to address it in words of unusual severity. 

What, then, is the explanation ? Our Lord on 
this occasion revives the old typical or picture- 
teaching with which the Hebrews were to that 
hour so familiar. He, as the greatest of prophets, 
adopts the significant and impressive method, not 



THE FIG-TEEE. 195 

unfrequently employed by the Seers of Israel, who, 
in uttering startling and solemn truths, did so by 
means of symbolic actions. As Jeremiah of old 
dashed the potter's vessel down the Valley of Hin- 
nom, to indicate the judgments that were about to 
befall Jerusalem ; or ; at another time, wore around 
his own neck a wooden yoke, to intimate their 
approaching bondage under the King of Babylon ; 
or, as Isaiah " walked naked and barefoot three 
years for a sign and wonder upon Egypt and 
Ethiopia," so did our Lord now invest a tree in 
dumb nature with a prophet's warning voice, and 
make its stripped and blighted boughs eloquent of 
a nation's doom ! 

On the height of their own Olivet, looking down, 
as it were, on Jerusalem, that fig-tree becomes a 
stern messenger of woe and vengeance to the whole 
house of Judah. Often before had he warned by 
His words and tears ; now He is to make an insig- 
nificant object in the outer world take up His pro- 
phecy, and testify to the degenerate people at once 
the cause, the suddenness, and the certainty of their 
destruction ! Let us join, then, the Master and 
His disciples, as they stand on the crest above 



196 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Bethany, and, gazing on that fruitless leaf-hearer, 
"hear this parable of the fig-tree."* 

Jesus, on approaching it (it seemed to he at a 
little distance from their path), and finding abun- 
dance of leaves, but no fruit thereon, condemns it 
to perpetual sterility and barrenness. 

A difficulty here occurs on the threshold of the 
narrative. If, as we have noted, and as St Mark 
tells us, cc the time of figs was not yet" — why this 
seeming impatience — why this harsh sentence for 
not having what, if found, would have been un- 
seasonable, untimely, abnormal? 

In this apparent difficulty lies the main truth 
and zest of the parable. The doom of sterility, 
be it carefully noted, was uttered by Jesus, not so 
much because of the absence of fruit, but because 
the tree, by its premature display of leaves, chal- 
lenged expectations which a closer inspection did 
not realise. "It was punished," says an able 
writer, " not for being without fruit, but for pro- 
claiming, by the voice of those leaves, that it had 
such. Not for being barren, but for being false." f 

* " If the miracles generally have a symbolical import, we have 
in this case one that is entirely symbolical." — Neander. 
f " Trench on the Miracles/' p. 444. See a full exposition of the de« 



THE FIG-TREE. 197 

Graphic picture of boastful and vaunting 
Israel ! This conspicuous tree, nigh one of the 
frequented paths of Olivet, was no inappropriate 
type, surely, of that nation which stood illustrious 
amid the world's kingdoms — exalted to heaven 
with unexampled privileges which it abused — 
proudly claiming a righteousness which, when 
weighed in the balances, was found utterly want- 
ing. It mattered not that the*heathen nations 
were as guilty, vile, and corrupt as the chosen 
people. Fig-trees were they, too — naked stems, 
fruitless and leafless ; but then they made no 
boastful pretensions. The Jews had, in the face 
of the world, been glorying in a righteousness 
which, in reality, was only like the foliage of that 
tree by which the Lord and His disciples now stood 
— mocking the expectations of its owner by mere 
outward semblance and an utter absence of fruit. 

The very day preceding, these mournful defi- 
ciencies had brought tears to the Saviour's eyes — 
stirred the depths of His yearning heart in the 
very hour of His triumph. He had looked down 

sign and import of this miracle in this exhaustive ami -acL«u*»Me 
dissertation. 



198 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

from the height of the mountain on the gilded 
splendours of the Temple Courts beneath; "but ; alas! 
He saw that sanctimonious hypocrisy and self- 
righteous formalism had sheltered themselves be- 
hind clouds of incense. Mamrnon, covetousness, 
oppression, fraud ; were rising like strange fire from 
these defiled altars ! 

He turns the tears of yesterday into an expres- 
sive and enduring parable to-day ! He approaches 
a luxuriant Fig-tree, boasting great things among its 
fellows, and thus through it He addresses a doomed 
city and devoted land, — " House of Israel," He 
seems to say, " I have come up for the last time 
to your highest and most ancient festival. You 
stand forth in the midst of the nations of the earth 
clothed in rich verdure. Tou retain intact the 
splendour of your ancestral ritual. Tou boast of 
your rigid adherence to its outward ceremonial, the 
punctilious observance of your fasts and feasts. 
But I have found that it is but ■ a name to live.' 
Tou sinfully ignore l the weightier matters of the 
law, judgment, justice, and mercy!' Tou call 
out as you tread that gorgeous fane — c The Temple 
of the Lord ! The Temple of the Lord! The Temple 



THE FIG-TREE. 199 

of the Lord are we!' You forget that your hearts 
are the Temple I prize ! Holiness ; the most accept- 
able incense — love to God, and love to man, the 
most pleasing sacrifice. All that dead and torpid 
formalism — that mockery of outward foliage — is to 
me nothing. ' Your new moons and Sabbaths — 
the calling of assemblies — I cannot away with ; 
it is iniquity even the solemn meeting.' These 
are only as the whitewash of your sepulchres to 
hide the loathsomeness within — c the rottenness 
and dead men's bones ! ' If you had made no im- 
pious pretensions ; I would not, peradventure, have 
dealt so sternly with you. If like the other trees 
you had confessed your nakedness, and stood with 
your leafless stems, waiting for summer suns, and 
dews, and rains, to fructify you, and to bring your 
fruit' to perfection — all well ; but you have sought 
to mock and deceive me by your falsity, and thus 
precipitated the doom of the cumberer. c Hence- 
forth, let no man eat fruit of thee for ever ! ' " 

The unconscious Tree listened ! One night only 
passed, and the morrow found it with drooping 
leaf and blighted stem! On yonder mountain 
crest it stood, as a sign between heaven and earth 



200 MEMORIES OF BETHANY* 

of impending judgment. Eighteen hundred years 
have taken up 'its parable — fearfully authenticated 
the averments of the August Speaker ! Israel, a 
bared, leafless, sapless trunk, testifies to this hour, 
"before the nations, that " heaven and earth may 
pass away, but God's words will not pass away !" * 

But does the parable stop here? Was there no 
voice but for the ear of Judah and Jerusalem? 
Have we no part in these solemn monitions ? 

Ah ! be assured, as Jesus dealt with nations so 
will He deal with individuals. This parable-mi- 
racle solemnly speaks to all who have only a name 
to live — the foliage of outward profession — but who 
are destitute of the " fruits of righteousness." It 
is not neglecters or despisers — the" careless — the 
infidel — the scorner — our Lord here addresses. He 
deals with such elsewhere. It is rather vaunt- 
ing hypocrites — wearing the garb of religion — 
the trappings and dress of outward devotion to 

* "The fig-tree, rich in foliage, but destitute of fruit, represents the 
Jewish people, so abundant in outward shows of piety, but destitute 
of its reality. Their vital sap was squandered upon leaves. And as 
the fruitless tree, failing to realise the aim of its being, was de- 
stroyed, so the theocratic nation, for the same reason, was to be over- 
taken, after long forbearance, by the judgments of God, and shut 
«/ut from His kingdom." — Neandeji, 



THE FIG-TEEE. 201 

conceal their inward pollution ; like the ivy, 
screening from view by garlands of fantastic "beauty 
■ — wreaths of loveliest green — the mouldering trunk 
or loathsome ruin ! We may well believe none 
are more obnoxious to a holy Saviour than such. 
He (Incarnate Teuth) would rather have the 
naked stem than the counterfeit blossom. He 
would rather have no gold than be mocked with 
tinsel and base alloy ! " I would" says He, 
speaking to one of His Churches at a later time, 
"I would thou wert cold or hot." He would 
rather a man openly avowed his enmity than that 
he should come in disguise, with a traitor- heart, 
among the ranks of His people. Oh that all such 
ungodly boasters and pretenders would bear in 
mind, that not only do they inflict harm on them- 
selves, but they do infinite damage to the Church 
of God. They lower the standard of godliness. 
Like that worthless Fig-tree, they help to hide 
out from others the glorious sunlight. They in- 
tercept from others the refreshing dews of heaven. 
They absorb in their leaves the rains as they fall. 
Many a tuft of tiny moss, many a lowly plant at 
their feet, is pining and withering, which, but for 



202 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

them, would Tbe bathing its tints in sunshine, and 
filling the air with balmy fragrance ! 

Solemn, then, ought to be the question with 
every one of us — every Fig-tree in the Lord's plan- 
tation—How does it stand with me? am I now 
bringing forth fruit to God? for remember what 
we are NOW, will fix what we shall be when our 
Lord shall come on the Great Day of Scrutiny ! 
We are forming now for Eternity ; settling down 
and consolidating in the great mould which ulti- 
mately will determine our everlasting state ; fruit- 
less now, we shall be fruitless then. The principle 
in the future retribution is thus laid down — " He 
that is unjust, let him be unjust still ; and he 
which is filthy, let him be filthy still." The de- 
mand and scrutiny of Jesus will on that day be, 
not what is the number of your leaves, the height 
of your stem, the extent of your branches? not 
whether you have grown on the wayside or in the 
forest, been nurtured in solitude or in a crowd, on 
the mountain-height or in the lowly valley : all 
will resolve itself into the one question — Where is 
your fruit ? What evidence is there that you have 
profited by My admonitions, listened to My voice, 



THE FIG-TREE. 203 

and accepted My salvation? Where are your 
proofs of love to#Myself, delight in My service, 
obedience to My will ? Where are the sins you 
have crucified, the sacrifices you have made, the 
new principles you have nurtured, the amiability 
and love and kindness and generosity and unsel- 
fishness which have supplanted and superseded 
Tbaser affections ? See that the leaves of outward 
profession be not a snare to you. You may be 
lulling yourselves to sleep with delusive opiates. 
You may be making these false coverings an 
apology for resisting the " putting on of the armour 
of light." One has no difficulty in persuading the 
tenant of a wretched hovel to consent to have his 
mud-hut taken down ; but the man who has the 
walls of his dwelling hung with gaudy drapery, it 
is hard to persuade him that his house is worthless 
and his foundation insecure. Think not that privi- 
leges or creeds, or church-sect or church-member- 
ship, or the Shibboleth of party will save you. It is 
to the heart that God looks. If the inner spirit be 
right, the outer conduct will be fruitful in righte- 
ousness. Make it not your worthless ambition to 
appear to be holy, but he holy! Live not a 



204 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

tl dying life " — tliat blank existence which brings 
neither glory to God nor good t# men. Seek that 
while you live, the world may be the better for 
you > and when you die the world may miss you. 
Unlike the pretentious tree in our parable-text, be 
it yours rather to have the nobler character and 
recompense; so beautifully delineated under a simi- 
lar figure three thousand years ago — " He shall be 
like a tree planted by the rivers of wa^er, that 
bringeth forth his fruit in his season. His leaf, 
also, shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth 
shall prosper.' 7 * 

Let us further learn, from this solemn and im- 
pressive miracle, how true Christ is to His word. 
We think of Him as true to His promises, do we 
think of Him, also, as true to His tlireatenings? 
Judgment, indeed, is His strange work. Amid a 
multitude of other prodigies already performed by 
Him, this " cursing" of the fig-tree formed the 
alone exception to His miracles of mercy. ~\ All 
the others were proofs and illustrations of bene- 

* Psalm i. 3. 

■ 

+ u In that of the devils in the swine there was no punishment, 
but only a permitting of the thing." — See " Stier's Words of the Lord 
Jesus/' vol. iii. p. 100. 



THE FIG-TREE. 205 

licence, compassion, love. But He seems to inter- 
pose this OXE, in case we should forget, in the afflu- 
ence of benignity and kindness, that the same God, 
whose name and memorial is " merciful and gra- 
cious," has solemnly added that " He can by no 
means clear the guilty." He would have us to 
remember that there is a point beyond which even 
Mis love cannot go, when the voice of ineffable 
Goodness must melt and merge into tones of stern 
wrath and vengeance. The guilty may, for the 
brief earthly hour of their impenitence, affect to 
despise His divine warnings, laugh to scorn His 
solemn expostulations. Sentence may not be exe- 
cuted speedily; amazing patience may ward off 
the descending blow. They may, from the very 
forbearance of Jesus, take impious encouragement 
to defy His threats, and rush swifter to their own 
destruction. But come He will and must to assert 
His claims as " He that is holy, He that is true." 
The disciples, on the present occasion, heard the 
voice of their Master. They gazed on the doomed « 
Fig-tree, but there seemed at the moment to be no 
visible change on fts leaves. As they took their 
final glance ere passing on their way, no blight 



206 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

seemed to descend, no worm to prey on its roots. 
The fowls of Heaven may have appeared soaring 
in the sky, eager to nestle as before on its 
branches, and to bathe their plumage on the dew- 
drops that drenched its foliage. But was the word 
of Jesus in vain? Did that fig-tree take up a 
responsive parable, and say, u Who made Thee a 
ruler and a judge over me?" 

The Lord and His apostles passed the place a few 
hours afterwards on their return to Bethany.* But 
though the Passover moon was shining on their 
path, the darkness, and perhaps the distance from 
the highway, veiled from their view the too truth- 
ful doom to be revealed in morning light. As the 
dawn of day (Tuesday) finds them once more on 
their road to Jerusalem, the eyes of the disciples 
wander towards the spot to see whether the words 
of yesterday have proved to be indeed solemn 
verities. One glance is enough ! There it stands 
in impressive memorial. One night had done the 
work. No desert simoom, if it had passed over it, 
could have effected it more thoroughly. Its leaves 
were shrivelled, its sap dried, its glory gone. Ever 

* Mark xi. 19. 



THE FIG-TREE. 207 

and anon afterwards, as the disciples crossed the 
mountain, and as they gazed on this silent 
lt preacher," they would be reminded that Jehovah- 
Jesus, their loving Master, was not " a man that 
He should lie, nor the son of man that he should 
repent." 

Ah ! Reader, learn from all this, that the wrath- 
ful utterances of the Saviour are no idle threats. 
He means what He says ! He is " the Faithful 
and True witness ; ' and though " mercy and truth 
go continually before His face," " justice and judg- 
ment are the habitation of His throne." You 
may be scorning His message — lulling yourself 
into a dream of guilty indifference. You may see 
in His daily dealings no sign or symbol of coming 
retribution ; you may be echoing the old challenge 
of the presumptuous scoffer — " Where is the pro- 
mise of His coming ? ' The fig leaves may have 
lost none of their verdure — the shy may be un- 
fretted by one vengeful cloud — nature, around you, 
may be hushed and still. You can hear no foot- 
steps of wrath ; you may be even tempted at times 
to think that all is a dream — that credulity has 
suffered itself to be duped by a counterfeit tale of 



208 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

superstitious terror ! Or if, in better moments, you 
awake to a consciousness of the Bible averments 
being stern realities, your next subterfuge is to I 
trust to that rope of sand to which thousands have 
clung, to the wreck of their eternities — an indefinite 
dreamy hope in the final mercy of God ! that on the 
Great Day the threatenings of Jesus will undergo 
some modification ; that He will not carry out to 
the very letter the full weight of His denunciations ; 
that the arm which love nailed to the cross of Cal- 
vary will sheathe the sword of avenging retribu- 
tion, and proclaim a universal amnesty to the 
thronging myriads at His tribunal ! 

" Nay ! man, who art thou that repliest against 
God?" Come to the fig-tree u over against" 
Bethany, and let it be a dumb attesting witness 
to the Saviour's unswerving and immutable truth- 
fulness ! Or, passing from the sign to the thing 
symbolised, behold that nation which God has for 
eighteen centuries set up in the world as a monu- 
ment of His undeviating adherence to His Word. 
See how, in their case, to the letter He has ful- 
filled His threatenings. Is not this fulfilment in- 
tended as an awful foreshadowing of eternal veri- 

■ 



THE FLG-TKEE. 209 

ties : if He has u spared not the natural brai: ~Jies," 
thinkest thou He will spare thee ? u If these 
things were done in the green tree ; what will he 
done in the dry? " 

Mourners ! You for whose comfort these pages 
are specially designed, is there no lesson of 'conso- 
lation to he drawn from this solemn u memory ? " 
Jesus smote down that Jig-tree — blasted and 
blighted it. Never again did He come to seek 
fruit on it. Ten thousand other buds in the Fig- 
forest around were opening their fragrant lips to 
drink in the refreshing dews of spring; but the 
curse of perpetual sterility rested on this! 

He has smitten you also, but it is only to heal I 
He has bared your branches — stripped you of 
your verdure — broken " your staff and your beau- 
tiful rod;" but the pruning hook has been used 
to promote the Vigour of the tree ; to lop off 
the redundant branches, and open the stems to 
the gladsome sunlight. Murmur not ! Remem- 
ber, but for these loppings of affliction you might 
have effloresced into the rank luxuriant growth of 
mere external profession. You might have rested 
satisfied with the outward display of Religious- 



210 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

ness 7 without the fruits of true Religion. Ton 
might have lived and died unproductive cum- 
levers, deceiving others and deceiving yourselves. 
But He would not suffer you to linger in this state 
of worthless barrenness. Oh ! better far, surely, 
these severest cuttings and incisions of the prun- 
ing knife, than to listen to the stern words — 
"Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone!" 
It is the most terrible of all judgments when God 
leaves a sinner undisturbed in his sinfulness — 
abandons him to " the fruit of his own ways, and to 
be filled with his own devices ; " until, like a tree 
impervious to moistening dews and fructifying 
heat, he dwarfs and dwindles into the last hope- 
less stage of spiritual decay and death ! 

u If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you 
as with sons ; for what son is he whom the Father 
chasteneth not? " 

" He purgeth it {joruneih it), that it may bring 

forth MOEE FBUIT." 



Closing Pours* 

The evenings of the two succeeding days seem 
to have closed around our adorable Lord at 
Bethany. We may still follow Him in imagina- 
tion, in the mellow twilight, as He and His disqiples 
crossed the bridle-path of the holy mountain from 
Jerusalem to the house and village of His friend. 

Much has changed since then ; but the great 
features of unvarying nature retain their imperish- 
able outlines, so that what still arrests the view of 
the modern traveller, in crossing the Mount of 
Olives, we know must have formed the identical 
landscape spread out before the eyes of the Incar- 
nate Redeemer. It is more than allowable, there- 
: fore, to appropriate thg words of the same trust- 
worthy recent spectator, from whose pages we have 
already quoted, as presenting a truthful and verit- 
able picture of what the Saviour then saw. 

From almost every point in the journey, there 



212 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

would be visible " the long purple wall of the Moab 
mountains, rising out of its unfathomable depths ; 
these mountains would then have almost the effect 
of a distant view of the sea, the hues constantly 
changing; this or that precipitous rock coming out 
clear in the evening shade — there the form of what 
may possibly be Pisgah, dimly shadowed out by 
surrounding valleys — here the point of Kerak, 
the capital of Moab, and future fortress of the Cru- 
saders — and then, at times all wrapt in deep haze, 
the mountains overhanging the valley of the sha- 
dow of death, all the more striking from their con- 
trast with the gray or green colours of the hills 
through which a glimpse was caught of them."* 



We have no recorded incidents in connexion with 
these two nights at Bethany. We are left only to 
realise in thought the refreshment alike for body 
and spirit our Lord enjoyed. Exhausted with 
the fatigues of each day^ and the advancing 
storm-cloud ready to burst on His devoted head, 
we may well imagine how grateful repose would 
be in the old homestead of congenial friendship. 

* "Sinai and Palestine/' p. 165. > 



CLOSING HOUES. 213 

The last evening He spent at the " Palm-clad 
Village'' must in many ways have been fall of sor- 
rowing thoughts. He had, in the afternoon, on 
His return from Jerusalem, when seated with his 
disciples " over against the Temple," gazing on its 
doomed magnificence, been discoursing on the 
appalling desolation which awaited that loved and 
time-honoured sanctuary. This had led Him to 
the more sublime and terrific theme of a Day of 
Judgment. Not only did He foresee the grievous 
obduracy of His own infatuated countrymen, but 
His Omniscient eye, travelling down to the consum- 
mation of all things, wept over the fate of myriads, 
who, in spite of atoning love and mercy, were to 
despise and perish. 

He left the threshold, consecrated so oft by His 
Pilgrim steps, on the Thursday of that week, not 
to return again till death had numbered Him 
among its victims. On that same morning He 
had sent His disciples into the city to make pre- 
paration for the keeping of the Passover Supper. 
He Himself followed, probably towards the after- 
noon, and joined them in " the Upper room," where, 
after celebrating for the last time the old Jewish 






214 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

rite, he instituted the New Testament memorial or 
His own dying love. Supper being ended, the 
disciples, probably, contemplated nothing but a 
return, as on preceding evenings, by their old route 
to Bethany. Singing their paschal hymn, they 
descended the Jehoshaphat ravine, by the side of 
the Temple. The brook Kedron was crossed,, and 
they ars once more on the Bethany path. They 
have reached Gethsemane ; their Master retires 
into the depths of the olive grove, as was often 
His wont, to hold secret communion with His 
Father. But the crisis-hour has at last arrived! 
The Shepherd is about to be smitten, and the sheep 
to be scattered ! Rude hands arrest Him on His 
way. In vain shall Lazarus and his sisters wait 
for their expected Lord ! For Him that night 
there is no voice of earthly comforter — no couch of 
needed rest ; — when the shadows of darkness have 
gathered around Bethany, and the pale passover 
moon is lighting up its palm-trees, the Lord of 
glory is standing buffetted and insulted in the hall 
of Annas. 

The Remembrances of Bethany ai^ here ab- 
sorbed and overshadowed for a time by the darker 



CLOSING HOURS. 215 

memories of Gethsemane and Calvary. Jesus 
may, indeed, afterwards revisit the loved haunt of 
former friendship* but meanwhile He is first to 
accomplish that glorious Decease, but for which 
the world could never have had on its surface one 
Bethany-home of love, or been cheered ~bj one ray 
of happiness or hope. 

In vain do we try to picture, as we revert to the 
peaceful Village, the feelings of Lazarus, Martha, 
and Mary on that day of ignominious crucifixion ! 
where they were — how they were employed ! Can 
we imagine that they could linger behind, uncon- 
cerned, in their dwelling, when their Best Friend 
was in the hands of His murderers? We cannot think 
so. We may rather well believe that among the 
tearful eyes of the weeping women that followed the 
innocent Victim along the " Dolorous way," not the 
least anguished were the two Bethany mourners ; 
and that as He hung upon the cross, and His lan- 
guid eye saw here and there a faithful friend 
lingering around him while disciples had fled, 
Lazarus would be among the few who soothed and 
smoothed that awful death-pillow ! Perhaps even 
when death had sealed His eyes, and faithless 



216 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

apostles gave vent to their feelings of hopeless 
despondency, " We trusted it had been He who 
should have redeemed IsraeS^ \ the family of 
Bethany would recollect how oft He had spoken of 
this very hour of darkness and bereavement which 
had now come ; Mary would, in trembling emotion, 
(in connexion with the humble token of her own 
gratitude and affection,) remember the words of the 
Lord Jesus, how He said, " Let her alone, against 
the day of my hurying hath she done this." 

We need not pursue these thoughts. We may 
well believe, however, that when the first day of 
the week had come — and the glad announcement 
spread from disciple to disciple, u The Lord is 
risen indeed" — on no home in Judea would the 
tidings fall more welcome than on that of Lazarus 
of Bethany. Martha and. Mary had, a few weeks 
before, experienced the happiness of a restored 
Brother. Now it was that of a restored Saviour ! 
Whether He revisited these, His former friends, 
the days immediately after His resurrection, 
we cannot tell. It is more than probable He 
would. May not some hallowed unrecorded 
" Memories of Bethany" be included in the closing 



CLOSING HOUKS. 217 

words of John's gospel — " There are also many 
Other things which Jesus did ?" On the way to 
Emmaus He joined Himself to two disciples, and 
" caused their hearts to hum within them as He 
talked by the way.' 3 So may He not have joined 
Himself to the friends with w r hom He had so oft 
held sacred intercourse during the days of His 
humiliation — breathing on them His benediction, 
and discoursing of those covenant blessings which 
He had died to purchase, and which He was about 
to bestow, "set as king on His holy hill of Zion." 
With what a new and glorious meaning to Martha 
must her Saviour's words have now been invested, 
" lam the Resurrection and the Life — he that believ- 
eth on Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." 

As the God-man, He had power over her bro- 
ther's life — He had now demonstrated that He had 
u power over His own;" — " power" not only to 
" lay it down," but u power to take it up again." 
Her Lord had u spoken once, yea twice had she 
heard this, th&t power belongeth unto God." 

The Grave of Bethany was thus in her eyes in- 
separably connected with the grave at Golgotha, 
But for the rolling away of the stone from a more 



218 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

august sepulchre, her brother must still have "been 
slumbering in the embrace of death. u But now 
had Christ risen from the dead, and become the 
first-fruits of them that slept." 

The Almighty Reaper had risen Himself from 
the tomb, with the sharp sickle in His hand. In 
the person of His dearest earthly friend He pre- 
sented an earnest-sheaf of the great Resurrection- 
reaping- time — when the mandate was to be carried 
to the four winds of heaven, " Put ye in the 
sickle, for the harvest is ripe ; — Multitudes — multi- 
tudes in the Valley of Decision." 

Can we participate in the joy of the family of 
Bethany ? Have we, like them, followed Christ 
to His cross and His tomb, and listened to the 
angelic announcement, " He is not here, He is 
risen ? " Have we seen in His death the secret 
of our life? Have we beheld Him as the Great 
Precursor emerging from Hades, and shewing to 
ransomed millions the purchased path of life — the 
luminous highway to glory? Let our hearts be 
as Bethany dwellings, to welcome in a dying risen 
Jesus. Let us not expel Him from our souls by 
wr sins — crucifying the Lord afresh, and putting 






CLOSING HOURS. 219 

Him to an open shame. Let not God's restoring 
mercies be, as, alas ! often they are to us, unsanc- 
tijied; — receiving back our Lazarus from the brink 
of the tomb, but refusing, on the return of health 
and prosperity, to share in bearing our Lord's cross 
— to " go forth with Him without the camp — bear- 
ing His reproach." If He has delivered our souls 
from death, and our eyes from tears, be it ours to 
follow Him through good and through bad report. 
Not alone amid the hosanna,hs of His people, or 
amid the world's bright sunshine, but, if need be, 
to confront suffering, and trial, and death for His 
sake. Like the Bethany family, let us mourn His 
absence, and long for His return. It is but for " a 
little while" we "shall not see Him" — "again 
a little while and we shall see Him." Oh, blessed 
day! when the words of. the old* prophet will start 
once more into fulfilment, and a voice from Hea- 
ven will thus address a waiting Church — " Rejoice, 
daughter of Zion, behold thy King cometh! " He 
cometh! — but it is now with no badges of humilia- 
tion — with no anticipations of sorrow and woe to 
mar that hour of glory, " His head shall be crowned 
with many crowns " — all His saints with Him to 



220 MEMORIES OF BETHANY- 

share His triumph, and enter into His joy. May 
we be enabled to look forward to that blessed 
season when, arrayed in white robes, with golden 
crowns on our heads, and palms of victory in our 
hands, these shall be cast at His feet, and the 
feeble Hosannahs of time shall be lost and merged 
in the rapturous Hallelujahs of eternity ! 



XXI. 

8$» fast sTrnt. 

What saddening thoughts are associated with 
our final interview with a Beloved Friend ! He 
was in health when we last met 5 we little dreamt, 
in parting, we were to meet no more. Every cir- 
cumstance of that interview is stored up in the 
most hallowed chambers of the soul. His last 
words — his last look — his last smile — they live 
there in undying memorial I Such was now the 
case with the disciples. They had their last walk 
together with their beloved Master. Ere another 
sun goes down over the western hills of Jerusalem 
He will have returned from His consummated Work 
to the bosom of His Father I 

And what is the spot which he selects as the 
place of Ascension ? — What the favoured height or 
valley that is to listen to His farewell words? 



222 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Still it is Bethany — the loved home of cherished 
friendship, where, so lately, hours of anticipated 
anguish had been mitigated and soothed. The 
spot which, above all others, had been witness to 
His fears and His Omnipotence, is selected as that 
from which, or near to which, He is to bid adieu 
to his sorrowing Church on earth. Although there 
seem to be no special reasons for this selection, we 
cannot think it was altogether undesigned or insig- 
nificant. Our Lord was still Man — participating 
in every tender feeling of our common nature ; and 
ju'st as many are known in life to express a par- 
tiality for the place of their departure, where they 
would desire their last hours to be spent, or for the 
sepulchre or churchyard where they would prefer 
their ashes to be laid ; — so may we not imagine 
the Saviour, reverting in these, His last hours, to 
the hallowed memories of thai hallowed village, 
wishful that Pie might ascend to heaven- within 
view, at least, of the spot He loved so well ? 

Whether this be the true explanation or no, we 
are called now to follow Him, in thought, from His 
concluding visit in Jerusalem to the scene of As- 
cension, We may imagine it, in all likelihood, 



THE LAST VISIT. 223 

the early dawn of day. The grey mists of morn- 
ing were still hovering over the Jehoshaphat valley, 
as for the last time he descended the well-known 
path. He must have crossed the brook Kedron 
— that brook which had so oft before murmured in 
His ear during night-seasons of deep sorrow — He 
must have passed by Gethsemane — the thick 
Olives pendant with dew, the shadows of early day 
still brooding over them. Their gloomy vistas must 
have recalled terrible hours, when the sod under- 
neath was moistened with " great drops of blood." 
Can we dare to imagine His sensations and feel- 
ings when passing now ? Would they not be 
the same as that of every Christian still, while 
passing through memories of trial, " It was good 
for me to be here?' Had He dashed untasted to 
the ground, the cup which in the depths of that 
awful solitude He had grasped six weeks before, 
His work would have been undone — a world yet 
unsaved ! But He shrunk not from that baptism 
of blood and suffering. Gethsemane can now 
be gazed upon as a place of triumph. His Om- 
niscient eye, as He now skirts its precincts, 
connects its awful struggles with the Bedenip- 



224 MEMOETES OF BETHANY. 

tion and joy of ransomed myriads through all 
eternity. He has the first realising earnest of 
the prophet's words, — Seeing of the fruit of " the 
travail of His soul/' He is " satisfied." 

But vain is it to conjecture feelings and emotions 
unrecorded. It would, doubtless, not be on Him- 
self the Great Redeemer would, in these waning 
hours of earthly communion, chiefly dwell. They 
would rather be occupied in preparing the hearts 
of the sorrowful band around Him for His ap- 
proaching departure. He would unfold to them 
the glorious conquests which, in His name, tltey 
were on earth to achieve, as His standard-bearers 
and apostles, and the ineffable bliss awaiting them 
in that Heaven whither He was about to ascend as 
their Forerunner and Precursor. It must indeed 
have been to them a season of severe and bitter 
trial ! They had in their hearts a full and tender 
impression — a gushing recollection of three years' 
unvarying kindness and affection — sorrows soothed 
— burdens eased — ingratitude overlooked — treach- 
ery forgiven. Many others they could only think 
of in connexion with altered tones and changed 
affection. He was ever the same! But the sad 



THE LAST VISIT. 225 

day has really came when they are to be parted 
for time ! No more tender counsels in difficulty, 
— no more gentle rebukes in waywardness, — no 
more joyous surprises, as on the shores of Tiberias, 
or the road to Emmaus, when, with joyful lips, 
they would exclaim, — "It is the Lord!" This 
dream of blissful intercourse, like a meteor-flash, 
was about to be quenched in darkness. Their 
Lord was to depart, and long, long centuries were 
to elapse ere His gracious face was to be seen 
again ! 

Whether, in this ever-memorable walk to the 
place of Ascension, the Adorable Redeemer visited 
the village of Bethany, we cannot tell. It is pos- 
sible — it is more than possible — He may have 
honoured the home of Lazarus with a farewell 
benediction ; but this we can only conjecture. All 
the notice we have regarding it is : that " He 
led them out as far as to Bethany;" that He there 
lifted up His hands and blessed them; and was from 
thence taken up to Heaven.* Honoured hamlet ! 

* " On the wild uplands/' says Mr Stanley, " which immediately 
overhangs the village, He finally withdrew from the eyes of His dis- 
ciples, in a seclusion which, perhaps, could nowhere else be found so 
near the stir of a mighty city, the long ridge of Olivet screening those 



226 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

thus to "be alone mentioned in connexion with the 
closing scene in this mighty drama ! He selected 
not Bethlehem, where angel hosts had chanted His 
praise ; nor Tabor, where celestial beings had hov- 
ered around Him in homage ; nor Calvary, where 
riven rocks and bursting^ grave-stones had pro- 
claimed His deity ; nor the Temple-court, in all its 
sumptuous glory, where for ages His own Shekinah 
had blazed in mystic splendour ; but He hallows 
afresh the name of a lowly Village ; He conse- 
crates a Home of love. Bethany is the last spot 

hills, and those hills the village beneath them, from all sight or 
sound of the city behind ; the view opening only on the wide waste 
of desert rocks, and ever-descending valleys, into the depths of the 
distant Jordan and its mysterious lake. At this point the last in- 
terview took place. He led them out as far as to Bethany. The 
appropriateness of the whole scene presents a singular contrast to#Le 
inappropriateness of that fixed by a later fancy, ' Seeking for a sign' 
on the broad top of the mountain, out of sight of Bethany, and in 
full sight of Jerusalem, and thus an equal contradiction to the letter 
and the spirit of the Gospel narrative." — P. 192. 

The same writer, in another place (p. 450), says, " Even if the 
evangelist had been less explicit in stating that He led them out \ as 
far as to Bethany,' the secluded'hills (that especially to which Tobler 
assigns the name of Djebel Sajach) which overhang that village on 
the eastern slope of Olivet, are evidently as appi opriate to the whole 
tenor of the narrative, as the startling, the almost offensive publicity 
ef the traditional spot, in the full view of the whole city of Jeru- 
salem, is wholly inappropriate, and (in the absence, as it now ap« 
pears, of even traditional support) wholly untenable." 






THE LAST VISIT. 227 

which lingers on His view, as the cloud comes 
down and receives Him out of sight. 

Let us gather for a little in imagination on this 
sacred ground. Let us note a few of the interest- 
ing thoughts which cluster around it, and listen to 
the Saviour's farewell themes of converse there 
with His beloved disciples. 

(1.) He cheers their hearts with the promised 
baptism of the Holy Ghost. — " John/ 7 He had 
said, a few hours before, at His last meeting with 
them in Jerusalem, " truly baptized with water ; 
but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not 
many days hence."* He, moreover, enjoined 
them to linger in the Holy City, and wait this 
"promise of the Father" which "they had heard 
of Him;" and now, once more, when on the eve 
of Ascension, He speaks of the coming of the 
same Holy Ghost to qualify them for their future 
work.f 

This, we know, was the great topic of consola- 
tion with whicb He had often before soothed their 
hearts at the thought of parting. He was to leave 
them 5 — -but an Almighty JP&rccclete or Comforter was 
* Acts i. 5. f Aots L 8. 



228 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

to take His place, whose gracious presence would 
more than compensate for the withdrawal of His 
own. For when, on the intimation of His coming 
departure. He observed that sorrow was filling 
their hearts — " It is expedient/' said He, " for you 
that I go away : for if T go not away, the Comforter 
will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will 
send him unto you." * 

Now that the anticipated hour is come, He reverts 
to the same omnipotent ground of comfort; — that 
this Divine Enlightener, Cheerer, Sanctifier, would 
fill up the gap His own withdrawal would make. 
They were about to enter on a new dispensation— 
the dispensation of the Spieit — and the approach- 
ing Pentecost was to give them a pledge and 
earnest of His mighty agency in the conversion of 
souls. 

Jesus, our adorable Lord, has ascended to " His 
Father and our Father — to His God and our 
God ! " We, like the disciples, have to mourn the 
denial of His personal presence. His Church is 
left widowed and lonely by reason of His depar- 
ture. But have we known, in our experience, the 

* John xvi. 7. 



THE LAST VISIT. 229 

value of tlie great compensating boon here spoken 
of? Have we known, in the midst of our weak- 
ness and wants, our griefs and sorrows, the power 
and grace of the promised Paraclete ? It is to be 
feared we do not realise or value His blessed 
agency as we ought. To what is much of the 
deadness, and dullness, and languor of our frames 
.to be traced — the poverty of our faith, the luke- 
warmness of our love, the coldness of our Sabbath 
services, the little hold and influence of divine 
things upon us ? Is it not to the feeble realisa- 
tion of the quickening, life-giving power of this 
Divine Agent? a It is the Spirit that quickeneth." 
Church of the living God! if you would awake 
from your slumber and apathy ; if you would ex- 
hibit among your members more faithfulness, more 
zeal, more love, more unselfishness, more union — 
if you would buckle on your armour for fresh 
conquests in the outlying wastes of heathenism, 
it will be by a fresh baptism of the Holy Ghost! 
Another Pentecost will usher in the Millennial 
morning. The showers of His benign influences 
will form the prelude to the world's great Spiritual 
Harvest. " Pray ye, then ; the Lord of the Hax- 



230 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

vest/' that His Spirit may u come down like rain 
upon the mown grass, and a& showers that water 
the earth/' and that the promise regarding the 
latter-day glory may be fulfilled — u I will pour 
down^ My Spirit upon all flesh." Or would you 
have Jesus made more precious to your own soul? 
Would you see more of His matchless excellences, — 
the glories of His person and work, — His suitable- 
ness and adaptation to all the wants and weak- 
nesses, the sorrows and temptations, of your tried 
and tempted natures. Pray for this gracious 
Unf older of the Saviour's character. This is one 
of His most precious offices — as the Revealer of 
Jesus. " He shall glorify Me; for He shall re- 
ceive of Mine j and shall shew it unto you ! " * 

(2.) Another theme of Christ's converse, when 
within sight of Bethany, was the nature of His 
Kingdom — - u Lord, wilt thou at this time restore 
again the kingdom of Israel? " was the inquiry of 
the disciples. u And he said unte them, It is not 
for you to know the times or the seasons which the 
Father hath put in His own power."")" 

The thoughts of His followers were clinging to 

* John xvi. 14 f Acts i. 6, 7. 



THE LAST VISIT. 231 

the la3t to the dream of earthly sovereignty. How 
difficult it is to get even the renewed and regene- 
rated mind to understand and realise Heavenly 
things, and to wean it from what is of the earth 
earthy ! He checks their presumption — He tells 
them these are questions which they may not pry 
into. There is to he no present fulfilment of these 
visions of millennial glory. That day and that 
hour are to he wrapt in unrevealed and impene- 
trable secrecy. The Church may not attempt rashly 
and inquisitively to lift the veil. She is not to 
know the time of the Saviour's appearing, that she 
may live every day in the frame she would wish 
to be found in when the cry shall be heard, " Be- 
hold the Bridegroom cometh." The apostolic 
band are, in the first instance, to be cross-bearers, 
as He their Master was, — witnesses to H?s suffer- 
ings, earthen vessels, defamed, persecuted, reviled, 
—before they become partakers of His purchased 
happiness and bliss ! 

Nevertheless, it was a grand and glorious mis- 
sion He sketched out for them. How worthy 
of Himself — of his loving, forgiving, unselfish 
Spirit — was the opening clause in that wondrous 



4S. 



232 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Missionary Charter He then put into their hands. 
Even at the moment when all the memory of 
Jewish ingratitude was fresh on His heart. He 
inserts a wondrous provision of mercy and 
grace. They were to proclaim His name through 
the wide world; but was Jerusalem (the scene 
of His ignominy) to form an exception? Kay, 
rather they were to begin there I The Gospel- 
Trumpet was to be sounded in its streets. The 
assassins of Gethsemane, the murderers of Calvary 
were to listen to the first offers of pardon arid 
reconciliation — " And He said unto them . . . 
that repentance and remission of sins should be 
preached in His name among all nations, beginning 
at Jerusalem ! ' Precious warrant, surely, are these 
words to " the chief* of sinners" to repair to this 
gracious Saviour. If even for " the Jerusalem 
sinner" there is mercy, can there be ground for 
one human being to despair? 

But " beginning ' at Jerusalem, the Gospel 
Commission did not end there ? It was to 
embrace, first, "Judea," then " Samaria," then 
" the uttermost parts of the earth." * The 

* Acts i. 8. 



THE LAST VISIT. 233 

ascending Redeemer's expansive heart took in 
with a vast sweep the wide circle of humanity. 
From the elevated ridge of Olivet, on which He 
now stood with the arrested group ■ around Him, 
He might tell them tor gaze, in thought at least, 
far north beyond the Cedar Heights of Lebanon 
and Hermon ; — Southward to the desert and the 
Isles of the Ocean ; — Westward to the fair lands 
washed by the Great Sea ; — Eastward across the 
palm-trees of Bethany and the chain of Moabite 
mountains on unexplored continents, where hea- 
thenism still revelled in its rites and orgies $f 
impurity and blood. With Palestine as their 
centre and starting-point, the vast World was to 
be their circumference. The Gospel was to* be 
preached " as a witness to all nations." The Great 
Mission-Angel was to u fly through the midst of 
Heaven," having its everlasting truths to " preach 
to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and 
people." 

Are we faithfully fulfilling our Lord's farewell 
Apostolic Commission? As members of the 
Church of God, component parts of the Royal 
Priesthood, are we doing what lies in our power, 



234 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

that His name, and doctrine, and salvation, be 
proclaimed to the uttermost parts of tlie earth? 
Or is it so, that we are looking coldly, suspiciously, 
indifferently on the Church's efforts in the cause 
of Missions, suffering her funds to fail, and her 
schemes to languish, and her devoted servants to 
sink in discouragement? Or rather, are we pre- 
pared to incur the responsibility of heathen souls, 
through our neglect, passing hour by hour into 
eternity, with a Saviour's name unheard of, and a 
Saviour's love unknown? Go to the Rocky ridge 
atove Bethany, and listen to. the parting injunc- 
tion of our Great Master. His last words, ere the 
cloud received Him to glory, were Missionary 
words, a Missionary appeal, a pleading for the 
Gospel being sent to heathen shores. Ah! our 
own Britain was then among the number ! If the 
Apostolic Company had in these days, like many 
among ourselves, refused, on the ground of the 
home-heathen in Judea, to send any of their band 
abroad, where would we have been at this hour? 
With our Druids' altars, our bloody sacrifices, our 
cruel rites ! But their best and noblest were com- 
missioned to speed from port to port in the Medi- 



THE LAST VISIT. 235 

terranean and the Isles of the Gentiles, with the 
Gospel errand on their lips, and the blessing of 
God on their labours ! All honour to these leal- 
hearted men, who, in spite of national and heredi- 
tary prejudices, implicitly followed the will of their 
Lord and Master, who had given to them, as He 
has given to us, a great Missionary motto — " The 

FIELD IS THE WOKLD ! " 

And now His themes of instruction and comfort 
are over — He is about to Ascend ! The symbolic 
cloud — (invariable emblem of Deity) — comes down 
to conduct Him to His throne. What a moment 
was that! Glory in view — the hallelujahs of 
angels floating in His ear — the air thronged with 
celestial hosts waiting as His retinue to bear Him 
upwards ; — all heaven in eager expectancy for her 
returning Lord. And yet — how is He employed ? 
Is the world, that had so disowned Him, disowned 
now in return ? Are the disciples, who have so 
oft deserted Him, now deserted in return ? — their 
name forgotten in the thought of the loftier spirits 
who are to gather around Him in the skies ? Nay, 
His every thought is centered on the weeping band 



236 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

of earth. u He lifted up his hands and blessed 
them ! "■• His last words are those of mercy — -His 
last act is outstretching His arms to bless ! It was 
an act replete with meaning to the Church of God 
in ^every age. Jesus, when He was last seen on 
earth, wore no terror on His lips — but He left our 
world pouring a benediction on His redeemed 
people. 

There is something, moreover, significant in the 
recorded fact that " while He blessed them, He 
was parted from them!' The Benediction, was 
unfinished when the cloud bore Him away ! As 
they gazed upwards and upwards till that glorious 
form was diminishing in the blue sky above, still 
His hands were extended; — the last dim vision 
which lingered on their memories was the True 
High Priest blessing the representative Israel of 
God ! It would seem as if He wished to indicate 
that the act begun on earth was to be carried on 
and perpetuated in heaven — that though parted 
from them, His outstretched arms would still plead 
for them on the Throne. His voice could no longer 

* Luke xxiv. 50. 



THE LAST VISIT. 237 

be heard — but His blessing still would continue to 
descend till He came again ! 

Wondrous close to a wondrous life ! We have 
traversed in thought many other memorials of 
Bethany. We have stood by the gate where 
Martha met her Lord — the silent sepulchre which 
listened to the voice of Omnipotence — the holy home 
where friendship was realised such as earth never 
before or since beheld. But surely not less sacred or 
hallowed than any of these is the scene presented 
on the green ridge rising to the west of the village, 
overlooking its groves of palm. Before supersti- 
tion ventured to raise its cumbrous monument on 
the heights of Olivet, may we not think of the 
scene of the Ascension, rather in connexion with 
three living Temples ? May we not think of it as 
oft and again visited by Martha, and Mary, and 
Lazarus ? May we not well imagine it would form 
a hallowed retirement for solemn meditation ! 
Amid more sorrowful thoughts, connected with 
their Lord's absence from them, would they not 
there often muse in holy joy over the now fulfilled 
prophetic strains of their minstrel King ? — " Thou 
hast ascended on high, Thou hast led captivity 



238 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

captive : Thou hast received gifts for men ; yea, for 
the rebellious also ; that the Lord God might dwell 
among them" * 

Do we love also to linger in spirit on that spot, 
and listen to th#t benediction? — "Blessed," we 
read, " are they that know the joyful sound.' 1 In 
these words there is a beautiful allusion to the 
sound of the pendant bells on the vestment of the 
High Priest in the Jewish temple of old. When 
the assembled multitudes in the outer court heard 
their music within the holiest of all, it conveyed 
the assurance that the High Priest was there, 
actively engaged in his official duties — sprinkling 
the Mercy Seat with blood, and pleading for the 
nation. They felt " blessedness ' in hearing and 
'knowing "that joyful sound." Beautiful type of 
Jesus the Great High Priest within the veil ! We 
seem, as we behold Him standing on the crest of 
Olivet, to listen to the first note of these gladsome 
chimes. He leaves His Church proclaiming nothing 
but blessings. As He rises upwards, and the 
diminishing cloud recedes from sight, still the 
music of benediction seems to float on the calm 

* Ps. lxviii. 18. 



THE LAST VISIT. 239 

morning air. The Golden Bells are sounding — 
and though the celestial notes cease, it is only 
distance which renders them inaudible. They 
are still pendant at His Royal Priestly robes, 
telling ns that still He intercedes ! Oh ? let us now 
hear His benediction ! Let the comforting thought 
follow us wherever we go — " Jesus is pleading for 
me loithin the Veil" He left this world Messing — 
He is engaged in blessing still. " He EVEB, LIVETH 
TO MAKE INTEKCESSION FOE US." 



y 



XXIL 

%xtQdu €owdoxhxn. 

The Lord lias ascended. The disciples are left 
alone in wondering amazement. The bright cloud 
which formed His chariot had swept majestically 
upwards— till (dimming on their view) the gates 
of heaven closed on Him ; who, a moment before, 
had been breathing upon them farewell benedic- 
tions of peace and love. Are they to be left alone ? 
Terrible must have been the feeling of solitude on 
that lone mountain-ridge, as the voice of mingled 
Omnipotence and Love was hushed for all time. 
" Alone, but yet not alone ! " While their eyes 
are still directed up to the spot where they got 
the last glimpse of the vanishing cloud — trans- 
fixed there in speechless Sorrow, lo ! " two men 
stood by them in shining vestures !" The Saviour 
has departed; the sunshine of His own loving 



ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 241 

presence is gone — but Pie leaves their not nn- 
solaced. The vision of the patriarch is again 
realised. When, like that weary pilgrim, de- 
jected, disconsolate, and sad — a ladder of com- 
fort is stretched down from the heaven on which 
they gaze, and ll the Angels of God are ascending 
and descending on it !' ' 

Ah ! whenever the Lord removes one comfort, 
He is ready to supply another. He Himself leaves 
His disciples — but no sooner does He leave, than 
Angels come and minister to them ; and this is 
immediately followed by a mightier than Angelic 
Comforter — even the fulfilled promise of the 
Holy Spirit. " If I go not away, the Comforter 
will not come unto you, but if I depart, I will 
send Him unto you." How graciously does Jesus 
thus adapt Himself to the character and trials of 
His people ! What compensations He gives when 
they are suffering tribulation! One blessing is 
taken away — it is only that they may be brought 
more fully to value others which remain. A be- 
loved friend is removed by death — the household 
is saddened at the stroke — its aching hearts are 
smitten and withered like the grass — but new 



242 MEMORIES OF BETHANY* 

spiritual consolations are imparted, unknown before 
— brighter manifestations of the Saviour's grace 
and mercy- are vouchsafed— -the Promises of God, 
like the ministering angels on Mount Olivet, are 
sent to hover around these stricken spirits. They 
are made to sing of u mercy" in the midst of 
"judgment! " 

Is Hagar in the desert ? There is a fountain 
(though at first unseen) at her side ! Is Elijah 
trembling in the dark cave of Horeb ? There is a 
"still small voice" amid the long-drawn breath 
of the tempest, and earthquake, and storm ; — ■" The 
Lord is there! " Be assured He will never leave 
nor forsake any that truly seek Him. To all deso- 
late ones, who, like the Olivet disciples, lift the 
steadfast eye of faith heavenwards, bending like 
them in the silent attitude of resignation and faith 
— God will send comfort. He will have his angels 
ready to wipe weeping eyes and soothe sorrowful 
hearts. 

We cannot grapple with this doctrine. "We who 
are creatures of sense, who are cognisant through 
a corporeal organism only of what is tangible and 
material, cannot grasp what relates to the immate* 



ANGELIC C0MF0E1EES. 243 

rial, invisible, spiritual. We strive in vain to 
realise the truth of Angelic Beings compassing 
our earthly path, joying with us in our joys — aid- 
ing us in our perplexities, and mingling their 
accents of comfort with us in our seasons of 
sorrow. But though mysteriously invisible, we 
believe there are hosts of these blessed mes- 
sengers thronging around, profoundly interested 
in all that concerns us — u bearing us up in all 
our ways" — following us, as Jacob saw them, 
step by step up the ladder of salvation, till we 
reach our thrones and our crowns ! Angelic agency 
is no mere gorgeous dream of inspired poetry — no 
mere symbolic way of stating the doctrine of 
Divine Providence, and the peculiar care which 
God takes of His Church and people. The Bible 
gives us too many positive statements on the sub- 
ject to permit a figurative interpretation. These 
bright and holy Beings are there represented as 
having witnessed all along w^ith profound interest 
the gradual unfolding of the plan of salvation — 
from the hour when, at creation's birth, the morn- 
ing stars sang together, and all the Sons of God 
shouted for joy — onwards to the eventful night 



244 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

when they met over the plains of Bethlehem and 
chanted a responsive anthem at the advent of 
the Prince of Peace! Now that Redemption 
is completed — they have gathered once more on 
Olivet to form a royal retinue to conduct their 
Lord to His crown — to summon the gates of 
Heaven to "lift up their heads' 5 that "the King of 
Glory may enter in." If God, in bringing in His 
first-begotten into the world, said, "'Let all the 
angels of God worship Him ;" much more, when 
His work is done, and the moral Conqueror, laden 
with the spoils of victory, is about to return to His 
throne, may we expect that " the chariots of God " 
("twenty thousand, even thousands of angels") 
are waiting to grace His triumph. 

Nor were they merely employed on earth as His 
servants and attendants during the period of His 
incarnation — leaving our world, when He left it 7 
to " serve him day and night in His heavenly 
temple." A portion of this glorious bodyguard 
we find now, at the hour of Ascension, left be- 
hind to certify to the disciples and the Church 
in every age, that Angels were still to continue 
their loving watchfulness and interest oyer the 



I 

ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 245 

Pilgrims in a Pilgrim world — still to be sent forth 
on errands of mercy to " minister to them who are 
heirs of salvation ! " 

Is it the House of God — the gates of Zion — the 
Holy place of Solemnities ? The scene now before 
us on Mount Olivet forms a miniature picture 
of what takes place Sabbath after Sabbath in 
every meeting of Christian disciples. As we are 
assembled like the apostles in our Sanctuary — 
looking upwards to Heaven ; there are glorious 
Spirits, we may well believe, clustering around us — - 
hovering in silence over our assembly — engaged, it 
may be, in unseen conflict with the emissaries of 
evil — assisting us in our prayers — joining with- us 
in our praises — waiting to waft these upwards, and 
get them perfumed with the incense of the Saviour's 
merits. 

Nor is it the Sanctuary alone they overshadow 
with their wings of light. The lowliest home- 
stead of the believer is oftentimes made a Ma- 
hanaim (" a Host"). The dwellers in the world's 
thousand Bethany-homes of simple faith and lowly 
love are "entertaining angels unawares." In the 
hour of sickness they are there unseen to smooth 



246 MEMOEIES OF BETHANY. 

our pillow. In the hour of danger they are at 
hand to u shut the lions' mouths." In the hour of 
bereavement they are employed "bringing messages 
of solace from the Intercessor within the veil ; and 
enabling us to " glorify God in the fires.' 5 In the 
hour of death they are waiting to lend their wings 
to the Immortal tenant as it bursts its earthly coil. 
Oh, if the return of the Repentant Sinner be to 
them an hour of joyous jubilee;— if their songs of 
triumph greet the ~Belie,Yer justified ;— what must it 
be to exult over the gladsome consummation — the 
Believer glorified ; to be engaged on the Great 
Day as Reapers at the ingathering of the sheaves 
into the heavenly garner — throwing open, at the 
bidding of their Great Lord, the Golden Portala 
that the ransomed millions may enter in! 

- " Oh never, till the clouds of time 

Have vanish'd from the ken of man, 
And he from yoiider heaven sublime 

Look back where mystic life began, 
Will gather'd saints in glory know 
What blessings men to angels owe. 

u This earth is but a thorny wild, 

A tangled maze where griefs abound, 
By sorrow vex'd, by sin denied, 

Where foes and friends our walk surround^ 
But does not God in mercy say, 
Angelic guardians line the way 1 







ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 247 

*' Sickness and woe perchance may have 

Ethereal hosts whom none perceive, 
Whose golden wings around us wave 

When all alone men seem to grieve; 
But while we sigh or shed the tear, 
Their sympathies may linger near. 

u When gracious beams of holy light 

From heaven's halfopen'd portals play, 
And from our scene of suffering night 
Melts nigh its haunted gloom away; 
Each doubt perchance some angel sees, 
And hovers o'er our bended knees ! 

** And when at length this wearied life 

Of toil and danger breathes its last, 
Or ere the flesh, with parting strife, 

Is down to clay and coldness cast ; 
The struggling soul can learn the story, 
How angels waft the blest to glory." * 

But, after all, can Angels really impart comfort? 
They cannot. They are but servants and delegates 
of a Mightier than they. Like all ministers and 
messengers, if they can dry a human tear and 
soothe a human sorrow, it is by pointing, not to 
themselves, but to their glorious and glorified Lord. 
What was their message now ? Was it, " We are 
come to supply the place of your Ascended Re- 
deemer— we are henceforth to be your appointed 
helpers — the objects of your faith, and hope, and 

e * Montgomery. 



248 MEMORIES OF BETHANT. 

confidence, in tlie house of your pilgrimage ? " 
No! The eyes of the disciples are gazing up- 
wards and heavenwards. The Angels tell them 
not in anywise to alter the direction of their 
thoughts and affections. They are musing (as in 
vain they still wistfully look for any relic of the 
chariot-cloud) on u Jesus only." They are to think 
of " Him only" still ! The Celestial Visitants seem 
to say, " Te men of Galilee, we cannot comfort you; 
— we would prove but poor solaces and compensa- 
tions for the Adorable Saviour who has left you. We 
come not to take His place — but to speak to you 
still regarding Him. He has left you ! but it is 
only for a season ; and better than this, although 
He has left you, He loves you as much as ever. 
Even in that distant glory to which He has sped 
His way, His heart is unchanged and unchange- 
able — His name is " Jesus Christ, the same yester- 
day, and to-day, and for ever." 

Here then was their, first theme of comfort. It 
was the name of Jesus. That " name of their 
Lord " was still to be their " strong tower ! " Oh, 
there is something touchingly beautiful about this 
angelic address. What a simple but sublime 



ANGELIC COMFORTERS. £49 

antidote for these stricken Spirits, " Thai same 
jesus." " That same Jesus," — He who la d His 
infant head on the manger at Bethlehem — Hs who 
walked on the Sea of Tiberias, and hushed its 
angry waves — He who spoke comfort to a stricken 
spirit at the well of Sychar, and at the gate of 
Nam — He who, in yonder palm-clad village sleep- 
ing in quiet loveliness at their feet, soothed the 
pangs of deeply afflicted hearts, and made death 
itself yield its prey — He who had first shed His 
tears and then His blood over the city He loved — 
He who so freely forgave, so meekly suffered, so 
willingly died! u That same Jesus" was still on 
High ! The Brother's form was still there ! The 
Kinsman-Redeemer's sympathy was still there! 
Though all Heaven was then doing Him homage — 
though He had exchanged the chilling ingrati- 
tude of earth for the glories of an unsullied world 
of purity and love — yet nothing could blot out 
frojri His heart the names of those whom He had 
still left for a little season behind, to be bearers 
of His cross before they became sharers of His 
crown ! 

What a comfort, amid all earth's vicissitudes 



250 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

and changes, this motto-yer.se ! Earth may change. 
Since the Lord ascended, earth has changed! There 
are u Written rocks " — manifold more than those of 
Sinai — that hear engraven on their farrowed -brows, 
" The w<£ld passeth away." Ocean's old shores 
have transgressed their boundaries — kingdoms have 
risen and fallen — thronging cities have sprung up 
amid desert wastes — and proud capitals have been 
levelled with the dust. Friends may change ; our 
very lot and circumstances, in spite of ourselves, 
may change. Our fondly planned schemes and 
cherished hopes may vanish into thin air, and the 
place that now knows us know us no more! But 
there is One that changeth not — a Rock which 
stands immutable amid all the ceaseless heavings 
and commotions of this mortal life — and that Rock 
is Christ ! 

Has he ever failed us ? Ask the tried Chris- 
tian. Ask the aged Christian. That gray-haired 
believer may be like a solitary oak in the forest — 
all his compeers cut down — tempest after tempest 
has sighed and swept amid the branches— tree by 
tree has succumbed to the blast — there may be 
nothing, but wreck and ruin and devastation all 



ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 251 

around. Friend after friend lias departed; some 
have altered towards him; kindness may have 
given way to alien looks and estranged affection ; 
others are removed by distance— old familiar faces 
and scenes have given place to new ones ; — others 
have been called away to the silent grave — sleep- 
ing quiet and still in " the narrow house appointed 
for all living." That aged lonely Christian can 
clasp his withered hands ; and exclaim, through his 
tears, u But Thou art the same, and Thy years 
shall have no end." " Heart and flesh do faint 
and fail, but God is the strength of my heart, and 
my portion for ever." 

" My God, I thank thee, Thou dost care for me; 
I am content rejoicing to go on, 
Even when my home seems very far away ; 
And over grief, and aching emptiness, 
And fading hopes a higher joy ariseth. 
In nightliest hours one lonely spot is bright, 
High over head, through folds and folds of space; 
It is the earnest star of all my heavens, 
And tremulous in the deep- well of my being, 
I*s image amswers. * * * * I will thine of Jesus."* 

But ; in addition to the name and nature of Jesus 
-. the Angels added a promise of comfort regarding 

• " Within and Without* 



252 MEMOKIES OF BETHANY. 

Him. u He shall so come in like manner as ye . 
have seen Him go into heaven." * Jesus shall 
come again ! 

When a beloved brother or friend whom we love 
is taken from ns by death ; how cheered we are by 
the thought of rejoining him in a brighter and 
better world. Even in earthly separations, how 
cheering the prospect of those severed by oceans 
and continents meeting once more in the flesh — 
the associations of youth renewed and perpetuated 
— and the long-severed links of friendship welded 
and cemented again ! What must be, to the bereft 
and lonely Christian, the thought of being restored, 
and that for ever, to his long-absent Saviour? 
Jesus shall come again! — it is the Church's 
" blessed hope" — the day when her weeds and 
robes of ashen sorrow shall be laid for ever aside, 
and she shall u enter into the joy of her Lord?" 
It is His return, too, in a glorified manhood. 
That same Jesus shall SO come ! Yes ! " so come," 
in the very body with which He bade the sorrowing 
eleven that sad farewell ! He left them with His 
hands extended, and with blessings on His lips, 

* Acts i. 11. 



ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 253 

He will return in the same attitude to greet His 
expectant Church, with the words, " Come, ye 
blessed of iny Father, inherit the kingdom pre- 
pared for you from the foundation of the world.' 1 

And if it be a comforting thought, " Jesus still 
the same, now seated on the Mediatorial throne," — 
equally comforting surely is the prospect that it 
will be in all the unchanging and undying sympa- 
thies of His exalted humanity, that He will come 
again as Judge. " God hath appointed a day in 
which He will judge the world in righteousness 
by that Man whom he hath ordained." He shall 
come, not arrayed in the stern magnificence of 
Godhead ! As we behold Him, we need not crouch 
in terror at His approach. Humanity will soften the 
awe which Deity would inspire. We can rejoice 
with Job not only that our Kinsman Redeemer 
"liveth" but that, as our Kinsman Redeemer, "He 
shall stand at the latter day upon the earth ! " 

Would that we more constantly lived under the 
realising power of this elevating thought — " Soon 
my Lord will come ! ' "Of the times and the 
seasons ye need not that I write unto you," It is 
not for us to dogmatize on the unrevealed period 



254 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

of the " glorious appearing/' The millennial trum- 
pet may in all probability sound over our slumber- 
ing dust — the millennial sun shine on the turf which 
may for centuries have covered our graves ! — But 
who, on the other hand, dare venture to question 
the possibility of the nearer alternative ? — that the 
Judge may be u standing before the door" — the 
shadow of the Advent Throne even now projected 
on an unthinking and unbelieving world ! " He 
that shall come icill come ; and will not tarry!" — 
Although it be true that eighteen hundred years 
have elapsed since that utterance was made, and still 
no gleam of the coming morning streaks the horizon 
— although the calculations and longing expecta- 
tions of the Church have hitherto only issued in 
successive disappointments ? yet the hour is nearing! 
As grain by grain drops in Time's sand-glass, it 
gives new significance and truthfulness to the 
Divine monition — " Behold, I come quickly ! " 

Ah ! if He may come soon — if He MUST come at 
some time, how shall I meet Him ? Will it be 
with joy? Am I shaping my course in life — my 
plans — my schemes — my wishes with what I feel 
would be in accordance with His will? Am I 



ANGELIC COMFORTERS. 255 

conscious of doing nothing that would lead me 
to be ashamed before Him at His coming? It 
would save many a perplexity — it would soothe 
many a heart-ache, and dry many a tear — if we 
were to make this great culminating event in the 
world's history, with all its elevating motives, more 
our guide and regulator than we do; — living each 
day, and ati our days, as if possibly the very next 
hour might disclose " the sign of the Son of Man 
in the midst of the Heavens !" Not building our 
nests too fondly here — not too anxious to nestle in 
creature comforts, but occupying faithfully the 
talents to be traded on which He has committed 
*to our stewardship ; straining, the eye of faith, 
like the mother of Sisera, for His approaching 
chariot ; and amid our griefs, and separations, 
and sorrows, listening to the sublime inspired 
antidote — " Stablish your hearts, FOR the coming 
of the Lord draweih nigh" 

Blessed — glorious — happy day ! And as His 

first coming was terminated by His Ascension, so 

will there be a second Ascension at His second 

Advent, with this important difference, however, 

that, as in the former, He left His Church behind 



256 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Him, orphaned and forlorn, to battle in a world of 
sorrow and sin ; in the other, not one unit among 
the rejoicing myriads, bought with His blood, will 
He debar from sharing in the splendour of His final 
entrance within the celestial gates. " The Lord 
Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout 
■ — with the voice of the archangel, and with the 
trump of God ; and the dead in Christ shall rise 
first. Then they who are alive and remain, shall 
be caught up together with them in the clouds, to 
meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be 
with the Lord." 

t( We must not stand to gaze too long, 

Though on unfolding heaven our gaze we bend ; 
When lost behind the bright angelic throng, 
We see Christ's entering triumph slow ascend. 

" No fear but we shall soon behold, 

Faster than now it fades, that gleam revive, 
When issuing from his cloud of fiery gold, 

Our wasted frames feel the true Sun and live» 

4i Then shall we see Thee as Thou art, 
For ever fix'd in no unfruitful gaze, 
But such as lifts the new created heart 
Age after age in worthier love and praise** 



xxni. 

The time has come when the disciples must leave 
the crest of Olivet and bend their steps once more 
to Jerusalem. Ah ! most sorrowful thought — most 
sorrowful pilgrimage ! Often, often had it been 
trodden before with their Lord's voice of love and 
power sounding in their ears. Often had it proved an 
Emmaus journey, when their hearts "burned within 
them as He talked to them by the way and opened 
unto them the Scriptures." But He is gone ! — that 
voice is now hushed — the well-loved path, worn 
by His blessed footsteps, and consecrated by His 
midnight prayers, must be trodden by them alone ! 
Willingly, perhaps, like Peter, on Tabor, would 
they have tarried on the spot where they last saw 
His human foim, and listened to the music of His 
voice, just as we still love to revisit some haunt of 



258 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

hallowed friendship and associate it with *?\ s name 
and words and features of the departed. But they 
dare not linger. As the disciples of this great 
and good Master, they dare not remain to indulge in 
mere sentimental grief, or in vain hopes and expec- 
tations of a speedy return. Life is too short — their 
Apostolic work too solemn and momentous, to suffer 
them to consume their hours in unavailing sorrow. 
We may imagine them taking their last look 
upwards to heaven, and then bending a tearful eye 
down upon Bethany— its hallowed remembrances 
all the more hallowed, that the vision is now about 
to pass away for ever ! The Angels, too, have 
sped away, and the eleven pilgrims begin their 
solitary return back to the city and temple from 
which the true Glory had indeed departed! 

And how did they return? What were their 
feelings as they rose to pursue their way ? Had 
we not been told far otherwise, we should have 
imagined them to have been those of deep dejec- 
tion. We should have pictured to ourselves a 
weary, weeping, troubled band; their countenances 
shaded with a sorrow too profound for words ; — the 
joyous melodies of that morning hour, all in sad 



THE DISCIPLES' RETURN. 259 

contrast with those hearts which were bowed down 
with a bereavement unparalleled in its nature since 
a weeping world was bedewed with tears ! They 
were going too ; as " lambs in the midst of wolves," 
to the very city where, a few weeks before, their 
Lord had been crucified, — the disciples of a hated 
Master, u not knowing the things that might befall 
them there." Could we wonder, if for the moment 
these aching spirits should have surrendered 
themselves to mingled feelings of disconsolate 
grief and terror. But how. different! Sorrow 
indeed they must have had ; but if so, it was 
counterbalanced and overborne by far other emo- 
tions ; for of the sorroiv 7 the Evangelist says 
nothing ; the simple record of this mournful jour- 
ney is in these words, " They returned to Jerusalem 
WITH great joy." Most wonderful, and yet most 
true ! Never did mourner return from a funeral 
scene — -(from laying in the grave his nearest and 
dearest) — with a heavier sense of an overwhelming 
loss than did that widowed orphaned band. And 
yet, lo ! they are joyful ! A sunshine is lighting 
up their faces. The " Sun of their souls" has set 
behind the world's horizon. But though vanished 



260 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

from the eye of sense, His glory and radiance seem 
still to linger on their spirits, just as the orb of day 
gilds the lofty mountain-peaks long after his 
descent. ■ They tread the old footway with elastic 
step ! ' As Gethsemane, and Kedron, and the 
Temple-path, are in succession skirted, while u sor- 
rowful, they are alway rejoicixg." Why is this? 
It was God Himself fulfilling in their experience 
His own promise, u As thy day is, so shall thy 
strength he." He metes out strength IN the day of 
trial, and FOR the day of trial. When we expect 
nothing "but fainting and trembling, sadness and 
despondency, He whispers His own promise, and 
makes it good, " My grace is sufficient for thee ; 
for my strength is made perfect in weakness." 

Who so faint as these disciples ? Think . of 
them in their by-past history, tossed on Gennesaret, 
cowering with dread in their vessel! Think of 
them in the Judgment-Hall of Pilate ; think of 
them at the cross ! Nothing there but pusillani- 
mity and cowardice. Nay ; when our Lord had 
spoken to them on a former occasion of this same 
departure, we read that u sorrow had filled their 
l&zrts." They could not bear the thought of so 



THE disciples' return. 261 

cruel a severance from all they held dear. But see 
them now — when the sad hour has come — lonely 
— unbefriended — their Lord hopelessly removed 
from the eye of sense; though but a few days before, 
they were traitors to their trust — unfaithful in their 
allegiance — bending, like bruised reeds, before the 
storm — behold them now, retraversing their way 
to Jerusalem, not with sorrow, as we might 
expect, but with joy. The Evangelist even notes 
the extent and measure of the emotion. It was 
not a mere effort to overbear their sorrow — an 
outward semblance of reconciliation to their hard 
fate — bnt it was a deep fountain of real gladness, 
welling up from their riven spirits. They re- 
turned, he tells us, with " great joy ! " 

Oh ! the wonders of the grace of Goct What 
grace has done — what grace can do ! We speak 
not of it now under its manifold other and diver- 
sified phases, — converting grace, and restraining 
grace, and sanctifying grace, and. dying grace- 
Here we have to do only with sustaining and sup- 
porting grace. But how many Christian disciples, 
in their Olivets of sorrow, have been able to tell 
the same experience ? How often, when a 



262 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

believer is stricken down with sore affliction-— 
when the hand of death enters his family — when 
the treasured life of the dwelling is taken, and he 
feels in the anticipation of such a blow as if it 
would smite Mm, too ; to the dust, and it were im- 
possible to survive the prostration of all that links 
him to life — when the tremendous blow comes, lo ! 
sustaining grace he never could have dreamed of 
comes along with it. He rises above his trial. 
Underneath him are the Everlasting arms. u The 
joy of the Lord is his strength ! " He treads along 
life's lonely way sorrowful, yet with a " song in the 
night." Amid earth's separations and sadness, he 
hears the voice of Jesus, saying, a Lo ! I am with 
you alway, even unto the end of the world." 

Oh, trust that Grace still ! It is the secret of 
your spiritual strength. u Not I, not I, but the 
grace of God that is with me ! " You may have 
to confront " a great fight of afflictions ; ' but that 
grace sustaining you ; you will be made " more than 
conquerors." " All men forsook me," said the 
greai Apostle, " nevertheless, the Lord stood with 
me, and strengthened me, and I was delivered 
out of the mouth of the lion." (: And God is 



THE DISCIPLES' RETURN. 263 

able to make all grace abound toward YOU ; that 
ye, always having all-sufficiency in all things, may 
abound to every good work." Tou have found 
Him faithful in the past ; — trust Him in the future. 
Cast all your cares, and each care, as it arises, on 
Him, saying, in childlike faith, u Undertake Thou 
for me ! " Then, then, in your very night-seasons, 
" His song will be with you." The Mount of 
your trial — the mournful, desolate, solitary, rugged 
path you tread, will be carpeted with love, fringed 
with mercy, and earth's darkest future will grow 
bright as you listen to a voice stealing from the upper 
sanctuary, " I will come again and receive you unto 
Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." 

In this scene of the disciples returning to 
Jerusalem, we are presented with the last picture 
of the Home of Bethany. Here the earthly 
vision is sealed, and we are only left to imagine 
Martha, and Mary, and Lazarus, when the joyous 
footfall that had cheered their dwelling could be 
heard no more, living together in sacred harmony, 
exulting in " the blessed hope, even the glorious 
appearing of the Great God their Saviour." * 

* Is it lawful to think of Bethany in connexion with the Churcli 



264 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

Did they live to survive the destruction of Jeru- 
salem ? Did they live to hear the tramp of tho 
Roman legions resounding through their quiet 
hamlet, and " the abomination of desolation/' the 
imperial eagles desecrating the hallowed ridges of 
Olivet ? Did they often repair to the meetings of 
the infant Church in Jerusalem, and delight to 
mingle with the under shepherds, when the u Chief 

of the Future ] Are there no foreshadowed glories found in the 
pages of Holy Writ, which include this lowly village — gilding it 
with the beams of a Millennial Sun ] Is ife destined to remain as it 
now is — a wreck of vanished loveliness 1 and is the crested ridge above 
it, which was the scene of the great terminating event of the Incar- 
nation, to be associated with no other august displays of the Re- 
deemer's power and majesty 1 ? The following remarkable prediction 
occurs in the prophet Zechariah : — " And his feet shall stand in 
that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on 
the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst there- 
of toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very 
great valley ; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the 
north, and half of it toward the south" Zech. xiv. 4. Were we of 
the number of those — (perhaps some who read these pages) — -who look 
with firm and joyful confidence to the Personal Reign of the Redeemer 
on earth, and who in their code of interpretation regarding unful- 
filled prophecy, espouse the literal in preference to the spiritual 
meaning, we might here have an inviting picture presented to us 
of the Bethany of the future. The Mount of Olives, by some great 
physical, or rather supernatural agency, is represented as heaving 
from its foundations, and parting in twain. The middle summit dis- 
appears. The remaining two form the steep sides of a new Valley, 
which, as it is spoken of as opening at Jerusalem (from Grethsemane), 
eastwards, the Vista must necessarily terminate with Bethany ; thus 



THE disciples' retuen. 265 

Shepherd" had gone? Or did the venerable 
company of Apostles love to resort ; as their Lord 
before them, to the old Village of palm-trees ; whose 
every memory was fragrant with their Master's 
name ? All these, and similar questions, we can- 
not answer. This we know and feel assured of — 
they are now gathered a holy and happy family in 
the true Bethany above — there never more to listen 

connecting the two most memorable spots associated with our Lord's 
humiliation. u His feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of 
Olives" — The once lowly Saviour again "stands" in power and great 
glory on the very spot over Bethany from which He formerly ascend- 
ed. A new highway from the " Village of Palms" is made for His 
triumphal entrance to the Holy City, while the air resounds with 
the old welcome— " Rejoice, daughter of Zion, behold thy King 
cometh ! " If further we turn with the literalists to the majestic 
Temple- Visions of Ezekiel, we find the front of the newly-erected 
structure facing wp this Valley ; a new stream — (indeed a mighty 
river) — gushes down from the temple-colonnade, flowing through the 
same gorge, and discharging its purifying waters into the Dead Sea, 
(Verse 8, and Ezekiel xlvii. 1-12 ; Joel ill. 18. The reader is referred 
to these passages in full.) From the geographical position, this river 
must needs, in the course assigned to it, flow nigh to the restored 
palm-groves of Bethany — thus murmuring by scenes consecrated for 
centuries by the footsteps and tears of a weeping Saviour. 

But if we cannot participate in these gorgeous literal picturings, we 
are abundantly warranted to take the words of the Prophet as delineat- 
ingtheglorious rssultsof the future restoration of the Jews to their own 
Jerusalem. "We^can think of the City of the Great King raised from 
her desolation, " her walls salvation, and her gates praise." The Mes- 
siah, once rejected, now owned and welcomed — "the children of Zion 
joyful in their King." We can think of the Yalley which is to divide 



266 MEMORIES OF BETHANY. 

to the voice of weeping, or hear the tread of the 
funeral crowd, or the wail of the Mourner ! 

And soon, too, shall many of us (let us trust) 
be there, to meet them ! Bethany, we have seen, 
had alike its tears and its joys; so will it be 
with every spot and every scene in this mingled 
world. But where the Family of Bethany now 
are, the motto is — u Never sorrowful, ALWAY re- 

the Mount of Olives — (the mountain bedewed with the memory of 
the Saviour's prayers) — we can think of that valley, and the stream 
which flows through it^ as emblematic of spiritual blessings. " Ask of 
Me," says God, addressing His adorable Son, "and I will give Thee 
the heathen for thine inheritance." Is not the symbolic answer here 
given ? The Mountain where the Saviour so " oft resorted" to "ask 
of His Father," is rent in sunder— every barrier to the progress of the 
truth is now swept away — the living stream of Gospel mercy issues 
from Zion (or rather, from Him who is the True Temple), that it 
may flow to the remotest nations of the earth ! As it enters the bitu- 
minous waters of the Asphaltite Lake, it is represented as curing 
them of their bitterness (Ezek. xlvii. 8, 9) ; descriptive of the 
power of the Gospel, whose living streams, like the symbolic " leaves 
of the tree of life," are for "the healing of the nations." Then 
shall the words of Isaiah be fulfilled, " Every valley shall be ex- 
alted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the 
crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. And the 
glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together." 
(Isa. xl. 4.) In the prophecy of Zechariah, to which we have just 
referred, we are told that in that same happy millennial period, the 
representatives of the world's nations will go up " year by year to 
worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, and to keep the feast of Taber- 
nacles" (Zech. xiv. 16.) Who can tell but this may be a literal 
revival of the old Hebrew festival, only invested with a new Gospel 



1 THE DISCIPLES' RETUEN. 267 

joicing /" And, better than all 3 while they never 
can be severed from one another, they never can 
be separated from their Lord. He is no longer now, 
as formerly at their earthly home, like " a way- 

and Christian meaning. " This feast," says a gifted expositor, "is 
the only unfulfilled one of the great feasts of Israel. Passover was 
fulfilled at Christ's death, and Pentecost at the outpouring of the 
Spirit. But this feast represents the Lord tabernacling with men, 
and is only fulfilled when t The Lord my God shall come, and all the 
saints with Thee.' On the Transfiguration-Hill, Peter, almost 
unwittingly, set forth this truth. He seemed to mean to say, ■ Is 
not this the true joy of the Feast of Tabernacles'? Is not the Lord 
here V" If this be so, we can think of the palm-groves of Bethany 
again bared of their branches ; — these waved in triumph as anew and 
nobler " Hosannah" awakes the ancient echoes of Olivet — "Blessed 
is He that cometh in the name of the Lord ! " As the regenerated 
children of Abraham build up the waste places in and around Zion, 
which forages have been "without inhabitant," and whose names 
are still dear to them — think we, amid other scenes of hallowed 
interest, they will not love, oftentimes to take the old " Sabbath- 
day's journey" to the site of "the Home of Mary and her sister 
Martha." While seated nigh the reputed burial-place, with the 
Gospel in their hands, reading, through their tears, the story of their 
fathers' impenitency, and of their Saviour's compassion and sympathy 
at the grave of His friend, will not a new and impressive truthful- 
ness invest one of the old Bethany utterances, " Then said the 
Jews, Behold how He loved him 1" * 

But these, after all, are merely speculative thoughts, on which we 
can build nothing. We have in these " Memories" to deal with the 
Bethany of the past, not with the imagined Bethany of the future. 
However pleasing, in connexion with the Honoured Village, these 
thoughts of a Millennial day may be, "nevertheless we, according 
to His promise, rather look for new Heavens and a new Earth, wherein 
dwelleth righteousness." 



268 MEMORIES OP BETHANY. 

faring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night/* 
No Olivet now to remind of farewells. They are 
"with Him" "seeing Him as He is," and that 
11 for ever and ever ! " 

And if, meanwhile, regarding ourselves, the 
journey of life has for a little still to be traversed, 
and the battle of life still to be fought ; blessed be 
God, u we go not a warfare on our own charges." 
The same grace vouchsafed to the disciples is pro- 
mised to us. That grace will enable us to rise 
superior to all the vicissitudes and changes of 
the journey. Let us rise from our Olivet-ridge 
and be going ; and though traversing different 
footpaths to the same Home — be it ours, like the 
disciples, to reach at last — a holy and happy com- 
pany — the true Heavenly Jerusalem — " WITH 
GbeatJoy." 

THE END. 

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